GIFTS of the EARTH

An excerpt from garden and interior designer Michael Mansvelt's longawaited book Everyday Opulence

There is something about Mary. She is bubbly, warm and easy to be around. My interactions with her are always so lovely; she makes everyone around her feel valued and loved.

She's a dream client and one of my greatest ambassadors. I first met Mary and her husband, lan, around 15 years ago when they were midway through construction of their new home beside the family farm.

Mary and lan were building their dream home and they were keen to plant a large country garden around it. As a landscape designer, I often work with people who wanta garden but are not necessarily gardeners themselves.

So I was delighted to find that the couple were both passionate gardeners and were committed to creating a legacy garden for their family to enjoy.

The home is set out in a boomerang shape to make the most of the sunlight and views of the surrounding farmland. The challenge for me was to design the garden in such a way that the individual garden spaces related to the angles of the house. Doing this gave me the opportunity to introduce plenty of dramatic vistas and focal points.

In the centre of the boomerang was the entrance, outdoor dining and covered porch. This became the centrepiece of the design and I placed large central steps there and an avenue of trees on either side of the house to form an alley to the property. This central axis became the backbone of the garden and the other lines of the garden flared off from this point.