Christine Whatley designed an ornamental kitchen garden, or potager, for a 200 year old gothic styled house in Wiltshire.
Christine passionately believes that vegetable gardens do not need to be purely utilitarian, but can be beautiful areas of the garden in their own right. In designing this garden, she reflected the individual styling of the house with an often quirky attention to detail, overlaid onto a strong horticultural foundation.
The original vegetable garden was productive, but very plain, and was also on a cold north facing slope. Christine designed a garden which had something of the feel of an old walled kitchen garden, by leveling the site to improve the growing conditions and surrounding the upper sides by brick retaining walls. Inspiration for the design came from the gothic arched windows of the house, and these shapes were incorporated into a traditional quadrant design.
The sunken nature of the garden has created an idyllic place to sit and rest, enhanced by a wall fountain alongside. As well as the fountain and lighting, features include decorative copper post caps and a carved wall plaque explaining the term Potager, both made by Christine especially for the garden. Gargoyles guard the entrances to the Potager (although they don't seem to be much of a slug deterrent!)
As much as possible was reused in making the Potager. The carved wall plaque and wall fountain both utilised left over stone blocks from an extension to the house, and the copper post caps were cut from an old water cylinder. The existing paving slabs were incorporated into varied patterns, and an old aluminium greenhouse was reinstalled and given a new lease of life with a coat of enamel.
Water is absolutely vital in a kitchen garden and water butts storing up to 1000 litres collect rainwater from the house and shed. A bank of compost bins were built alongside the Potager, reusing old chicken wire from the house thatch.
