I’ve been on my diploma journey for a few years, and hit a bit of a post half-way funk. Why am I doing this? Why has it become so burdonsome? What can I do to get going again? Do I want to carry on? These were amonst the questions on loop, in my head. Like many people I am demand avoidant, easily distracted, a productive procrastinator and find the slightest absurd excuse for not doing what I am supposed to…
Back in February, Storm Ciara hit the UK. I took some video to document the power of the water. This video is designed to be used as a tool to help us better design solutions to slow the flow of water, store water and work with the power of nature.
Most of our land sits in front of our house, but behind we have a relatively level small area of land. This area is lovely of an evening and hosts our existing greenhouse (which due to construction work we have been unable to access for quite a while. I wanted an area that we could sit out in the evening, and behind our house is perfect as it gets full sun in the evening. I also wanted to plant more…
So, after much measuring, deliberation, thinking, poking, drinking of wine and general musings, I came up with a workable plan! I had several iterations with lovely cascading ponds, swales and orchards, but reality wins every time; so, here it is, my grand plan! So, what does it contain? Woodland & Trees Existing We have about an acre of existing woodland, split over 2 sites. The lower woodland is a mix of Hazel, Ash, Holly, Rowan, Oak, Willow and Cherry; the…
Before embarking on this project I had some knowledge of our soil as well as some major presumptions. I presumed our soil was acidic and heavy clay, and that is was really thin and full of rocks. Our fields have been used for pasture and have fed our neighbours cattle for the past few years. They get particularly waterlogged at the bottom of the slopes, but hold a lot of water all over (especially on any relatively flat areas) As…
Mapping our land isn’t just an excuse to buy and use a new set of coloured pens (honest). Watched with amusement from Brian our friendly walling expert I set about measuring the earthworks behind our house and combined my findings with scaled up OS Map tracings. Drawing and maths aren’t my strong points, so mapping was one of the areas I was nervous about remembering what to do, and whether I’d get it right. I now had a huge base…
Ah, the all important client interview… who wants what, why, when. Over dinner one evening I grilled (I mean asked) my husband and daughters what they wanted to do more of as a family and what they wanted our home and land to be. I of course put my tuppence worth in the mix too. Yes, I mean to do this whole shebang as a proper project. The results were interesting Family Use outside more, do more bike rides and…