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Applying an artist's eye for colour and using a naturalistic plan, landscape designer and gardener Tim Pilgrim creates a cottage garden inspired by the loose beauty of meadows and prairies.

- Andrea Tomaz

With buckets of charm, great soil and a wet, cool climate that’s rather similar to the UK’s, Trentham in Victoria has plenty of beautiful cottage gardens growing in its midst. But landscape designer and gardener Tim Pilgrim tried something a little different – and extra-special – when his client, Rhonda, asked him to create a garden that would ‘soften’ the new residence on her block of land.

“Rhonda wanted a cottage garden aesthetic and she also liked the style of Dutch garden designer Piet Oudolf,” explains Tim. “He does a lot of perennial mass plantings in a naturalistic style, and plants in drifts rather than blocks. I drew on those ideas and was inspired by meadows and prairies.”