Anavah Garden Design

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Anavah Garden Design Co. Down gardener, helping folks to enhance & enjoy their gardens with planting designs and work.

🌷🥀2 0 2 6 s l o t s a v a i l a b l eMichelle's maternity year finishes in April - so with daddy daycare's return on...
13/01/2026

🌷🥀2 0 2 6 s l o t s a v a i l a b l e

Michelle's maternity year finishes in April -
so with daddy daycare's return on the horizon,
there'll be some diary reshuffling soon.

People who've asked for help with their gardens include busy professionals with tiny townhouse yards, elderly ladies in ex-council houses, billionaires with secret lairs, clients too ill to come to the door, Instagram influencers, experienced gardeners, nervous newbies, tough ol' farmers, knights of the realm, good dog-owners, bad dog-owners, Protestants, Catholics, Quakers, Italians and the French. Some want a full redesign, some already love their garden but just need a little help. Some have a weekly visit, some get in touch every few years, some don't know how much needs done but if-I-know-could-I-do-it-please.

All they've had in common is a feeling that a chat about the garden might be worthwhile.
If you're feeling that too, January is a really good time to get in touch.

Should 2026 be the year you scribble "sort garden" from your to-do list, I'd love to miss your phone call due to muddy gloves, miss your second call putting my kids to bed, but then successfully swap a few texts, and soon enough put together a plan that really helps you.

Josh
(07872617575)

13/01/2026

July 2025.
The wind continually comes across the fields into this client's garden, and it seemed natural to make a feature of it with some feathery grasses. It isn't reinventing the wheel, but seeing them flutter in the golden evening light, interspersed with
flowers, a few weeks after planting was really lovely. Just as well: this client has given me more tea & biscuits than could be numbered, so l'm delighted to see them happy.


13/01/2026

July 2025.
The family wildlife garden, four years in. I think with another four years it may devolve into pure jungle, in which case "mishmash", "hotchpotch" and other Nigella Lawson-esque words will be used even more desperately! I share this
with my hands over my face and emphasising the
words "work in progress" as much as possible.

June 2025.Just the eye of the beholder, but the flowers & basketball combo made me smile!It's the flattering comparison ...
13/01/2026

June 2025.
Just the eye of the beholder, but the flowers & basketball combo made me smile!
It's the flattering comparison between brilliant natural colours and faded artificial that I like, especially the fresh yellow of the trollius here.
Garden design pics don't often feature basketballs or unmown lawns, but I was so happy to see this client and their family members each constantly in and out the garden, enjoying it still five years after its design & planting. Some of this season's highlights here include Trollius 'Lemon Queen', a nice bicycle & pump, Cirsium 'Atropurpureum", lovely spaniel Suzy, Rosa 'Rock & Roll' and someone reading a book. Great to see something
once drawn on A4 paper nowadays full of life!

13/01/2026

June 2025.
Tying in a few roses, enjoying all
the bees - if the showers meant it wasn't a full
summer's day, it was certainly a lovely summery hour!

NB This beautiful garden is part of our maintenance, not my design.

13/01/2026

Aug 2024.
This little notebook of bespoke suggestions & advice is for a young family whose beautiful home has been designed to softly emulate traditional farming buildings. They want to develop their
garden in a similarly bucolic way, with understandably minimal maintenance, but of course these notes will only be passed on to them with the firm condition that they recognise they're already doing brilliantly.

May 2024.The design I am currently developing here is for clients trying to escape the little villain vine weevil, and f...
13/01/2026

May 2024.
The design I am currently developing here is for clients trying to escape the little villain vine weevil, and follows a few principles pieced together by my own experience in recent years, especially anything mirrored by other testimonies or advice I could find - and so farewell to lush evergreen
shrubs, and instead use of plants which spread or
self-seed with an ease to render a few losses less
dispiriting. Aromatic perennials seem to be recommended - my experience of those in these
circumstances is fairly mixed (geraniums, no; lavenders, yes). A tricky one! But we'll get there.
Making considered choices, keeping a close eye,
celebrating the flowers that come through, and not just drowning everything in chemicals.. we'll see what happens.

13/01/2026

May 2024.
A highlight of the last week has been a return to Yolanda and Trevor - whose garden I played a part in creating with them in 2021.

Being extremely glamorous and having some
extraordinary stories to share, they wouldn't necessarily have come across as people with ample time left in their diaries to devote to a garden - and so I have been delightfully surprised. In hindsight, the warmth of their hospitality to me from day one surely indicated what the plants could also expect from them - if plants can
be spoiled rotten, that is what appears to be happening in their beautiful sanctuary space. It is such a pleasure to visit them, and see the care with which everything is being tended.

Feb 2024.Finishing a winter garden design for a really lovely client in Co. Antrim.The concept of a "winter garden" cert...
13/01/2026

Feb 2024.
Finishing a winter garden design for a really lovely client in Co. Antrim.

The concept of a "winter garden" certainly exists, mostly in celebrated public gardens, but for someone to dedicate their own precious domestic space to it is very unusual and highly admirable. I hasten to add this was the client's idea from the beginning, and not my input at all!

Since August, the weekdays I've been at home with Evelyn we've set off on walks along the country lanes hoping to see doggies, cows & horses ("wuffwuff", "mMmm", "sus!" in E's developing lingo) - and naturally the front gardens we pass are also politely discussed. With the arrival of winter, there are of course fewer
things to see, and the walks have been done slightly less cheerfully, in the name of fresh air & good(ish) parenting rather than being inspired out of the front door.
This garden won't be on our lane, but it really delights me to think this client has the desire to create something with colour and fragrance to marvel at through these months, and not simply accepting this time of year as merely a thing to get through.

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Donaghcloney

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