Garden design in Harrogate
Haddon Studio: Harrogate landscape and garden design
We are award-winning garden and landscape designers based in North Yorkshire - creating biodiverse gardens in Harrogate as well as offering garden design in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, County Durham, as well as across the UK and Internationally.
At Haddon Studio we explore your garden ideas and inspirations. We assess your likes, dislikes and budget, as well as the garden site’s opportunities and limitations, to fulfil your garden’s potential, and to creating amazing outdoor spaces.
We will work with you to create your perfect garden - whether that is a garden for relaxation and contemplation, a place to actively garden or just potter around, or a space to socialise and entertain.
We are landscape and garden design experts in:
assessing your garden’s opportunities and limitations
visualising your garden’s potential in 3D
turning possibilities into 2D plans and plans into reality
designing with consideration for the development of plants over time, changing and growing through the seasons and years
We will work alongside you all the way from the initial soil survey through to the various stages of the design and build of your new garden; ensuring that the design meets your requirements and that the completed garden does too.
We create contemporary gardens, where people and wildlife co-exist
Your Harrogate Garden Designers
Matthew, Creative Director at Haddon Studio, lives in Yorkshire and has many years of experience when it comes to what plants grow well in a Harrogate garden. Plantsmanship expertise is combined with Haddon Studio’s technical and creative flair in the Masterplanning and technical detailing required to create a stunning garden for you to enjoy. Matthew is also one of only around 200 garden designers in the UK to be a Registered Member of the Society of Garden Designers (having passed their extensive accreditation process) and Haddon Studio is a Society of Garden Designers Registered Design Practice.
With years of experience working in and around Harrogate (in residential gardens and Show Gardens at the Harrogate Flower Shows) we will ensure that you get an amazing design for your Harrogate garden.
Examples of our garden designs include:
The gardens of Harrogate - and the Yorkshire Dales
The gardens of Harrogate and its surrounding villages, like all those in North Yorkshire, are some of the most beautiful in the UK. Haddon Studio’s experience creating gardens in Harrogate and its environs means that we have a clear knowledge and understanding of what our clients both want and need. Nestled within the stunning landscapes of Yorkshire, Harrogate offers opportunities to create uniquely beautiful biodiverse gardens.
Harrogate is a historic spa town and is the home of one of the RHS’s two northern gardens, RHS Harlow Carr (with its showcase of the Streamside, for moisture loving plants, its borders, and its arboretum, alongside the Alpine House and Winter Walk of colourful stems and evergreens). Harrogate is also home to Valley Gardens in the centre of the town and such gems as Harewood House, Newby Hall and the Himalayan Garden near to Ripon further afield. However for us it is the private residential gardens - from urban courtyards and Georgian or Edwardian front gardens, sub-urban new build gardens, and the larger country gardens (located from the Yorkshire Dales to the town centre) - that truly stand out.
Unique conditions for Harrogate gardens
Rainfall and mean temperature, across the seasons, are two vital factors to take into account wherever a garden is planned. Similarly soil structure and acidity are crucial.
Harrogate and its surrounding villages (as well as to the east when looking at York gardens) have almost entirely a mix of acidic soil types - from clayey and loamy soils to peat like soils in areas to the north and west. However we will always test the soil before starting work on the design of any new garden to make sure we have a complete understanding of your soil type. For example Hebes and Lilacs are very popular, and grow well when producing a garden design in Beverley and East Yorkshire, but if you try to grow them in a soil that is not alkaline they will struggle and eventually die. It is often the case that our clients believe they are not green-fingered when in fact they’ve simply tried to grow the wrong plant in the wrong place.
In a garden context there are a number of opportunities offered with plants that prefer (or actively require) acidic soil conditions. These include well known plant genus such as Rhododendron, Azalea, and Camellia to some less commonly seen plants - such as Pieris, most varieties of Magnolia, and blueberries.
The soil in and around Harrogate tends towards being made up of loam in the main (which is good for growing) and many areas also have a clay subsoil (which is also great for providing nutrients to grow a wide range of plants). Further east, York has similar soils to Harrogate whilst, heading even further east, Beverley and East Yorkshire have mostly clay-based alkaline soils.
Selecting hardy planting (trees, shrubs, perennials and grasses) for your Harrogate garden
In a garden context there are a number of opportunities offered with plants that prefer (or actively require) acidic soil conditions. These include well known plant genus such as Rhododendron, Azalea, and Camellia to some less commonly seen plants - such as Pieris, most varieties of Magnolia, and blueberries.
When it comes to selecting plants the local climate is also important so that you can ensure that the plants you choose are hardy enough to survive over winter. Most of the Harrogate area is classed as being an H5 area (in terms of plant hardiness, based on the RHS’s Hardiness Ratings for plants). Some of the higher altitudes of the Yorkshire Dales are H6 areas though. This may sound a little technical if you’re not a professional gardener but knowing this ensures you can select the right plants for your garden.
You should therefore select hardy plants (trees, shrubs, and perennials) that will survive winter temperatures down to -15 degrees centigrade - or to -20 degrees centigrade at higher altitudes. If you are using Hardiness Ratings to select plants you should choose plants with a rating H6 or H7 to ensure their survival anywhere in and around Harrogate, but you can include H5 plants in lower altitudes…(H4 plants may survive a milder winter in your garden but plants with a rating of H3 or less will need a greenhouse to survive).
