Long before Richard Miers became an award-winning garden designer, he was an eight-year-old who loved looking at flowers, plants, shrubs and trees more closely than his friends. It was an interest that caught the eye of his headmaster’s wife, who encouraged him to join the school gardening club, where he first planted and looked after his own patch. “It’s been a lifetime pursuit since,” says the London-based Miers, in the midst of installing the Nefelibata Cloud Walker at the House and Garden Festival.
Miers, who studied garden design at Merrist Wood College, Surrey, says he was fortuitous to meet designer Arne Maynard straight after graduation. “I was his right hand man for 10 years. I learnt an enormous amount from him and the 30 or so gardens we designed together,” says Miers, whose style has been described as Classical Contemporary. “I like geometry, straight lines, curves and symmetry, but I also like a looseness with the planting within the seeming formality.”
Over two decades, his style has translated into green spaces across Europe — gardens for a dacha in Moscow, a villa in Sardinia, a country garden for a heritage house in Norfolk, another for a newly-built Palladian mansion in Surrey and numerous town gardens in London. He’s been named among the top 10 garden designers by House and Garden Magazine (2011), been invited to design a show garden for The Daily Telegraph /House and Garden Fair (2007), and chosen to represent the UK in the Gardening World Cup at Nagasaki with his garden ‘Serenity’ (2012).
Excerpts from an interview:
What parameters help you decide the kind of garden?
I make sure the garden fits with the house and ties in with the existing landscape. I tend not to use a style (eg. Italian, French, Dutch or Japanese) but work out what it is to be used for. Is it for intimate dining, a drinks party, growing fruit or vegetables, or a pleasure garden to enjoy the tranquillity of Nature?
The Rill Garden at Stanhoe Hall
Your work has largely been for manors and villas. What would you recommend for compact urban spaces?
I enjoy creating compact urban gardens, as every single plant or detail has to fight for its place. What do you want the garden to do for you? Is it to be enjoyed in company or alone, does it need to be made private, do you want the sound of or to see water... I’d then recommend using the best natural materials you can afford and selecting plants or flowers. It’s important to build a repetition of colours, textures and shapes; repetition is beautiful to the human eye.
What’s your process when you select plants for a particular space?
All plants have evolved to exploit certain growing conditions and many have specialised. For example, lavender likes the sunshine and poor soil of the Mediterranean, so try to plant it where the conditions replicate that. Ferns grow better in the partial shade of a woodland floor. These are useful in small urban gardens shaded by buildings and small trees.
I make sure that the summer won’t be too hot for them or the winter too cold, that they will get enough rain at the right time of year, and that the soil is ideal. Some plants like sandy free-draining soil, some like moist and humus-rich, and there are conditions in between the two. The soil and growing conditions can be artificially changed, but it’s easier to find plants that like the conditions you have. Healthy plants look better and are less prone to pests than plants growing in the wrong conditions. The colours, shape and textures must work with the others, and lastly, the client and I should like them.
Is there a favourite kind of garden or a garden genre?
I am a fan of the 18th-Century Dutch style, but more currently of Belgium designers, especially the work of Jacques Wirtz. Hedges and trees provide structure in their gardens and help keep interest during the winter, but there is also a fluidity that stops it from looking fussy and formal.
How long do you work on a project?
I work on some just for six months, as the design is quick and the garden is ready to be worked on. Others take a year from start to finish, and there is one project in France that I’ve been working on for five years.
How important is sustainability to you?
Very important, as the world only has finite resources. I like to use recycled materials, such as old sandstone or bricks from a building that has passed its useful life. The added advantage is that they tend to have an aged patination that only time brings, giving the new garden an artificially accelerated age and gravitas. Also, any wood must come from carefully managed sources.
Do you plan to compile your works into a book?
That’s a very good idea, and thank you for making me think about it!
Is there a hobby very far removed from this?
I use a bicycle as my main mode of transport when getting around London, so that is almost like a hobby and keeps me fit and healthy. I love playing tennis, though I’m only an averagely good player.
