A blank canvas

Grove Ley garden, Somerton, Somerset The home of Dr and Mrs Michael Horder With many viewpoints and changes of level, this was not an easy site on which to make a garden, but key to its success, writes Caroline Donald, has been enlarging the pond and creating long beds full of robust perennials and grasses

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JAMES ALEXANDER-SINCLAIR and Monika Horder don't bother dancing around dainty conversational niceties: 'How many times did I tell you that you were taking on rather more than you can cope with?' asks the designer of his German-born client. 'Every time we met, which did of course rather irritate me,' says Mrs Horder. Mr Alexander-Sinclair now eats his words somewhat, as Mrs Horder, a retired Lloyds underwriter-turned-letterpress printer, has proved herself more than equal to managing the acre of ornamental and kitchen garden he created for her and her husband, Michael, around their home in Somerton, Somerset. 'It is a challenge that Monika has taken up admirably; it is quite extraordinary the way she has kept the garden going, whereas other people would have given up and turfed half of it over.'

‘The house looks out at a private green amphitheatre: rooms with a nice view’

When Dr and Mrs Horder were thinking about leaving west London for the country in 2016, their architect, Neil Choudhury, advised them to 'buy the ugliest house with the nicest view'. In the end, they bought two adjoining properties, knocked them down and built a contemporary house of blue lias stone and concrete, with lots of raw grey metalwork and a black zinc roof, tucked a little further down the slope than the original railway houses, to give it more privacy. Based on the principle of a Somerset longhouse, the reception rooms and the main bedroom are on the upper floor, with two wings hinged at a wide angle. This allows views over the whole reunited plot to the borrowed landscape of the neighbour's land beyond the stream. A field hedge topping the other slope creates a near horizon, so the house looks out at a private green amphitheatre: rooms, indeed, with a nice view. It is, however, a tricky site that includes multiple viewpoints and changes of level. 'As you see it all at once,' points out Mrs Horder, 'if you get it wrong, you get it really wrong'.