It’s autumn and, as I write this, I am sitting by the brook in my garden sheltered from the sun by an umbrella. The weather so far has been very changeable and there have been days when the heavy grey sky and constant rain have made it hard to leave the house and I have dreamt of scurrying home and getting cosy whenever I am out. Today belies all that and it feels more like summer albeit with a warm golden tinge to the trees and cool breeze.

My meadow beds look a little tired now - a mass of seedbeds and brown stems, flowers weather beaten and relatively sparse. It has its own beauty however, especially as the early morning or last sun of the day touch it when it glows - iridescent and golden.

And, this summer, it was a revelation. Who knew it could be so glorious? Well many people I suppose and not me - then. Now I do and my awe at what a small tiny speck of seed can become is hightened.

The meadow at full pelt in August - those poppies…

Knowing that my creative and budgetary limits wouldn’t stretch well to both creating a new garden and launching Growthfully in 2018 I’d chosen the latter and was, consequently, literally itching to get going earlier this year. An uncomfortable combination of unhelpful thoughts and judgemental feelings hit me however; ‘I’m not sure where to start’, I don’t know if what I have planned is actually what I want, and what if I don’t like the garden after we’ve spent lots of money on making changes?

I know - ironic isn’t it. All the things I help my clients overcome and I was experiencing them myself. Add to that the fact that I was telling myself that any self-respecting garden designer would have made a garden they loved by now and I was on a highway to nowhere.

It’s funny though - I sometimes need to take myself by surprise and, as I wrote about in my last blog, that’s what I did this time. Following on from the heady success of the greenhouse and veg beds i took the bull by the horns - lots of metaphors here - and, in the course of a month, ploughed on with the garden - literally as it turns out.

The meadow looked lovely in front of the greenhouse too…

I’ve written about that process before so I’m not going to go into it much here except to say that it still surprises me how just getting on with it is often the best way for me. Too much thinking leads to procrastination and inactivity and I can always adjust what I’ve done if I don’t like it.

So - anyway - back to the beds themselves. You may remember sowing a meadow was a temporary measure as it so late in the season already when I hit the ‘go’ button. We have, actually, decided to do the sam again next year as we’re considering change to the house before finalising the design of the garden.

Despite its temporary status the meadow was a success. More than that - it was actually a runaway success. It looked absolutely gorgeous once it got into its stride and every week changed slightly as something new started to flower and something we’d had for a while began to fade. I loved the contrast between the flat of the lawn and it’s verticality and regular structure and even once, what has been until this week, the rather wet autumn kicked in smashing and mashing the precious stems it is good to look at something rather than nothing.

I loved the verticality of the meadow stems against the flat of the lawn..

It was also a hive of activity on sunny, and even less sunny days this summer as the bees and other buzzy creatures loved it as much as I did and so did the frogs and, we think, vole. Though this last I don’t quite believe as I didn’t see it with my own eyes.

Having a mass of dense and high planting where none existed before has been a joy and has shown me very clearly, on the ground, that I’d like more of a sense of enclosure which means the lawn needs to be even smaller. How exciting. More changes. Though these, as I said, are going to wait for a while as we decide whether what we’d like to do to the house is actually feasible.

I’m sad that I can’t just plough ahead (there’s that so useful metaphor again) and it feels like the right decision. I will just have to focus on what I can do around the greenhouse and veg beds and look forward to sowing that new meadow seed come March. I’ll be in there early this time!

So - if you are considering turning some of your garden to meadow I really recommend it. I probably wouldn’t do it so close to the house, except as a temporary measure like me, as it doesn’t look good for as long as a well considered planting of perennials, grasses, shrubs and bulbs would and doesn’t offer much in the way of structure. Having said that, I sowed my meadow beds in the first week in June, they flowered mid July and then lasted until early October looking really very good.

View towards the stream and beyond. The land opposite - long grass - belongs to the Chiltern Society

So it’s not bad… And I’m going to leave them standing ‘till spring as I really believe in the beauty of dead stuff - it looks fab when frosted and wildlife will still be using it as shelter and food.

My mix was the Classic Mix from Pictorial Meadows - which I chose from a great selection because it offers a longer season of interest than some of the others.

What do you think? Where might you like to sow a meadow in your garden?

The bees loved our meadow...