The Delicate Balance between Sun and Light
We love our light-filled outdoor spaces but balancing light with excessive sun can be a tricky landscape design challenge. Ian Barker explains that establishing where the sun is positioned at [...]
Curves or Straight Lines?
There has been a pendulum swing between curves and straight lines since landscape design came into being. Gardens with mostly straight lines are more formal in appearance than those with [...]
Antique Perennials Bushfire Fundraiser
Anyone who has been following our garden design work over the years, will know how much we love our perennials. Our passion in creating gardens with naturalistic planting schemes would [...]
The Jellicoe Water Gardens Park, Hemel Hempstead, UK
In a very picturesque part of England, just an hour’s drive north-west of central London on a major tourist route, is The Jellicoe Water Gardens, a must visit parklands when [...]
Salvia nemorosa ‘Caradonna’ Balkan clary
The ornamental Salvias or Sages (yes, all relatives of culinary Sage) are an exceptional group of garden plants that just keep on giving – masses of flowers that is. Ian [...]
Blairgowrie – Garden Design and Construction Project
There’s nothing like a few challenges and this garden design project on the Mornington Peninsula certainly provided them. The site is particularly steep and the spectacular new home by Architects [...]
Powell & Glenn – Local Architects
Ian Barker Gardens were delighted to be working with Powell & Glenn, Melbourne-based architectural practice, on a recent landscape design project in Blairgowrie, after all, the renowned practice is the [...]
Farmer – The Cookbook
Now here is a wonderful Christmas gift that keeps on giving. Farmer – The Cookbook contains a variety of contemporary and traditional dishes by top chefs, including Maggie Beer, Stephanie [...]
Melaleuca lanceolata (Moonah, Black Tea-Tree and many others)
The dense spreading canopy of the native tree Moonah is a common feature of some streetscapes in Melbourne, where it proved a fairly inauspicious street tree over the years. However, [...]
Canterbury – Garden Design Project
When downsizing, property owners can often feel a sense of loss in what they’ve given up. Our Canterbury client was experiencing just that when she approached us midway through 2017, [...]