Our clients, for whom Charlotte Rowe had already created two roof terraces elsewhere, had bought a converted Victorian school on the Regent’s Canal in Islington. Extensive improvements were to be undertaken to the property including creating a new sub-basement for an open-plan kitchen with polished floors beneath the raised ground floor of the house, giving access to a 110 sq m South East-facing garden on two levels.
The garden design brief was to make an elegant contemporary-style external space visible from all floors of the property, with two sitting areas, one at the lower level for the morning sun and a second at the upper level, as well as a dining area. The stairs up to the upper level were designed asymmetrically to one side, to allow space for the built-in seating area at the lower level.
Islington
Charlotte Rowe Garden Design included a fireplace at the upper level to provide a focus from the house and to soften the effect of the 10m high brick wall at the end of the garden. Climbers and hedging were planted on either side of the fireplace to soften the façade.
Charlotte Rowe continued the interior grey polished poured concrete floors into the garden, with a darker grey gravel area and complementary grey render walls. Together with the dark trellis, they create a palette of materials and colours against which to set the rich planting, including two layers of hedging cutting laterally across space to provide interest and depth, and a mix of shrubs, grasses and perennials including Agapanthus.
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Photography by Marianne Majerus © Copyright
