A contemporary garden in London

Ketley Staffordshire blue bricks
Garden designer - Jilayne Rikards
Photography - Simon Bourne

Ketley bricks in a garden by designer Jilayne Rikards Image by Simon Bourne

This garden design project in East Finchley, London ran alongside the renovation of the entire house and a unifying approach was taken, with the house and garden project being viewed as one holistic space, to create a strong link between the interior of the house and its garden.

Award winning garden designer Jilayne Rikards selected materials to reflect the contemporary scheme inside the house and repeated the materials throughout her design to bring the house and garden schemes together. The curve of the lawn is aesthetically pleasing and it mirrors the undulating canopies of the surrounding oak trees. The curve is bordered on one side by a retaining wall in Staffordshire blue bricks, their bluish-grey colour matching the anthracite grey of the glazing framework. The Staffordshire blue bricks are also used to form stepping stones along the side of the lawn leading the way to some paved steps also of Ketley brick. The opposite side of the garden features the same blue bricks in an external wall as well as some border edging. Jilayne explains that "the seductive darkness of the bricks provides the most stunning backdrop for planting ".

external wall and garden edging in Ketley Staffs blue bricks in a garden by Jilayne Rikards image by Simon Bourne

Not many bricks can be used in so many different ways! However Ketley bricks are classified as Class A engineering bricks with extremely low water absorption. This means they are ideal for all landscaping applications where more than one face of the brick is exposed to the elements, and they can even be laid as paving.

a curved retaining wall in Staffs blue brick with matching stepping stone path by designer Jilayne Rikards image by Simon Bourne