Say goodbye to the lawn and the billowing herbaceous border, prepare to dismantle the carefully constructed rockery and the wrought-iron bench. The gardens of the future, apparently, are more likely to have metal walkways, sailcloth divisions and blow-up plastic furniture. Interior design, having conquered the great indoors, has now put on its wellies and headed for the garden.
One of the keys to successful contemporary garden design is "improving the link between the interior and the exterior", says Stephen Woodhams, in his new book Portfolio of Contemporary Gardens. He carries this concept a step further in his brave floral sculptures (flower arrangements is far too staid a word) which are an integral part of the decor at One Aldwych, the chic central London hotel which houses his florist's shop, Woodhams at One Aldwych. His futuristic otherworldly creations, poised on lofty perspex columns, bring the far reaches of outer space to the indoor environment.
As well as being hugely in demand for "floral events" and as a party organiser, Woodhams, now in his mid 30s, is an acclaimed garden designer. His exhibition gardens have won four medals, including a gold, at Chelsea Flower Show and Hampton Court Show.
Such credentials put him in the perfect position to define today's trends in fashionable garden design. In his compelling Portfolio of Contemporary Gardens he does this graphically, before advising how to put these ideas into practice. A directory of essential
modern materials and furniture, and 100 key plants makes this the complete primer for the 21st century DIY garden designer. And "designer", by the way, is the appropriate word, as this book has no truck with the mysterious business of growing plants, knowing the soil or getting closer to nature.
Its focus is purely on exterior design, with plants seen as useful items within a plan. As Woodhams writes: "Not for me the unfettered patchwork of a traditional country garden - I would rather have a garden clad with limestone paving, a bench and two plain stone pots, one planted with a Cedrus atlantica f. glauca blue cedar topped with pebbles and the other with a mound of Festuca glauca blue fescue grass."
His love of small, wellorganised urban spaces is evident, and it is in the dreaming up of dramatic plans for these tight areas that he excels. He likes nothing better than "creating an oasis in the middle of a city, such as London or New York". Although tall walls around a small garden may seem a daunting prospect to some householders, he finds them "a positive advantage", giving a comforting sense of enclosure where an urban sanctuary may be created.
Among his designs is a roof garden where a clean-cut, near-invisible conservatory (with rows of ostrich eggs set into a small, glass-topped, recessed floor chamber) opens into a compact space with flooring, built-in seating and planters all fashioned from galvanised metal. Another garden prompts us to worship at an altar-like wall of water in a cool, sacerdotal space bounded by tall bamboos and outlined in box hedging, gravel and limestone paving.
Woodhams's designs are unashamedly theatrical and are often very much of-the-moment. He frequently uses materials that may be easily rearranged or discarded when the mood changes: plastic, muslin, canvas, painted trellis. Some of the illustrations in his book depict exhibition gardens - his own and other designers' - from Chelsea and Chaumont, France. Many embody ideas that would be impossible to maintain from season to season, but they provide valuable stimulation to stretch the imagination.
Existing, permanent gardens are also featured, like the Parc Andre Citroen in Paris and those of the wonderful American designer, Martha Schwartz. And just in case anyone thinks that hard-edged garden minimalism was invented at the latter end of this century, an illustration of the restored 18th century garden at Erigny, Perigord - all clipped yew cylinders and hard geometry - proves that what goes round, comes round, again and again.
Portfolio of Contemporary Gardens by Stephen Woodhams is published by Quadrille (£25 in UK). Readers of The Irish Times can purchase this at the special price of £20 inc p & p. Simply telephone the credit card hotline on 00 44 1256 302 699 and quote ref. GLR 171 .
Stephen Woodhams will be at Waterstones in the Jervis Centre at 6 p.m. on Thursday, October 28th, to sign books and share garden design tips.
