Garden 03 · 2023
Gravel garden at the farm
A dry garden of gravel, thyme and feather grass around an old pear tree.
- Area
- 210 m²
- Size
- around the yard
- Build
- three weeks
- Budget, incl. VAT
- € 24.800
- Our role
- Design, planting plan and build
What was there
A sunny yard next to a white farmhouse, with sandy soil that turns bone dry in summer. The owners no longer wanted to water. The old pear tree had to stay.
What we drew
A gravel garden with plants that love drought. Pale gravel beds run like a stream between clumps of thyme, lavender and feather grass, to a bench of weathered oak under the pear tree.
“A gravel garden with plants that love drought.”
How we built it
We laid no weed membrane, just a thick layer of gravel on clean soil. That lets the plants self-seed. From the second season the sprinkler can stay off.
The drawing
This is the final design, seen from above. The codes in the plant clouds refer to the plant list below.
- 1Rhine gravel 4–8 mm on clean soil
- 2Feather grass and sea holly
- 3Lavender and creeping thyme
- 4Old pear tree, kept
- 5Bench of weathered oak
- 6Farmhouse wall
Plant list
| Number | Name | Common name | Interest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 90 | Stipa tenuissima | feather grass | Jun–Sep |
| 70 | Lavandula angustifolia ‘Hidcote’ | lavender | Jun–Aug |
| 110 | Thymus serpyllum | creeping thyme | Jun–Jul |
| 30 | Eryngium planum | sea holly | Jul–Sep |
| 40 | Achillea ‘Terracotta’ | yarrow | Jun–Sep |
| 24 | Euphorbia characias | spurge | Mar–May |
| 36 | Perovskia atriplicifolia | Russian sage | Aug–Oct |
Materials
- GravelPale yellow Rhine gravel 4–8 mm, 8 cm deep
- EdgingSteel edging, invisible
- BenchWeathered oak from an old barn
- TreeExisting pear tree, pruned
Shall we startwith a walk round your garden?
A consultation at your home takes an hour and a half and costs €145. Afterwards you have a first sketch and our notes. If you then go for a design, we deduct the amount.