Colleen Southwell's three tips for first-time gardeners
We’ve shared a little of Colleen Southwell's garden thinking before, and there’s still much more to borrow from her way of seeing a garden. She pays attention to what a place is already telling you. Its rhythm, its structure and the feeling it carries before a single new plant goes in.
Colleen is a professional fine artist, country garden maker, garden writer and host of creative garden-making workshops. Through her work, she explores the quiet connection between soil, studio, landscape and the small rituals of everyday life.
For anyone making a garden for the first time, Colleen’s advice begins not with planting, but with paying attention.
1. Observe first
Oddly, the first step is to do nothing.
Before planting, spend time simply being in the space. Notice where the sun falls, where the wind moves through, where water sits after rain and which corners you naturally gravitate towards.
A garden rarely needs to be decided all at once. In fact, the most convincing gardens tend to reveal themselves gradually. Give yourself permission to watch, learn and let the site guide you.
Gardens take time, and that is part of their charm. They shift with the seasons, plants settle in, some ideas work and others quietly fall away. The garden you begin with will not be the garden you have five years from now, nor should it be.
SHOP YOUR SPRING HAT
2. Consider how it should feel
It is easy to begin with pictures: flowers you love, colours you are drawn to, gardens saved to your phone.
But Colleen suggests thinking beyond how you want the garden to look and considering how you want it to feel.
Do you want it to feel sheltered and intimate? Loose and abundant? Calm and pared back? Perhaps you want somewhere that invites you to linger with a cup of tea, or a garden that feels generous enough for children, dogs and long lunches outside.
That feeling becomes a useful compass. It can guide decisions around planting, paths, seating and even the spaces you choose to leave open.
A garden is something you live in, not simply something you look at.
3. Build the framework first
Before becoming distracted by all the perennials and flowers you would like to squeeze in, think about the structure of the garden.
Trees, shrubs, hedges and other permanent planting form its framework. They create height, enclosure, rhythm and shelter, and they continue to give the garden shape long after seasonal flowers have finished.
This structural planting is what helps a younger garden begin to feel settled and considered.
Once those bones are in place, the softer layers can be added around them. Perennials, self-seeders, bulbs and all the changing detail that brings a garden to life through the year.
The result is not a garden that feels finished overnight, but one with enough structure to grow into itself over time.
SHOP YOUR SPRING HAT
More from Colleen
There is much more to explore in Colleen’s world.
If you’d like more support with your own garden, follow Colleen or visit her website and explore her Field Notes and online course, where she goes deeper into garden planning and design.
We’re not finished with Colleen yet. Expect more from the artist, writer and country garden maker behind The Garden Curator. Join our newsletter to follow along.
