Penny Snell has applied her florist’s eye to her one-acre Surrey garden at Moleshill House, where every inch has been thoughtfully curated with the greatest of care taken over plant associations and colour palettes
WORDS JILL ANDERSON PHOTOGRAPHS ANNA OMIOTEK-TOTT
It’s often recommended to wait a year or so after moving into a new house to see if any interesting plants pop up in the garden. After Penny Snell and her husband moved into their handsome Victorian house in Cobham, Surrey, over 33 years ago, that’s exactly what they did, hoping that a few choice plants would appear to relieve the unrelenting expanse of green grass surrounding the house.
Nothing new came up, but rather than feeling disappointed Penny was delighted to have a blank canvas. “I didn’t have any ideas about what to do with the garden – it just evolved over the years,” she recalls. At first a small border at the side of the house was created, and gradually more and more plants were established and a layout defined, until it became the garden it is today, packed with masses of plants and a variety of trees, shrubs and hedges.
It’s clear that Penny is someone who embraces change. A strip of land on the northern boundary was sold eight years after moving in, reducing the garden to just over an acre. An agreement was made with the new owner to build a wall around the garden. This has since become the perfect backdrop for plants, the warm colour of the brick showing them off to great advantage while also creating a comfortable feeling of enclosure and focusing attention into the garden.
Trees, box hedges, yew arches and arbours covered in climbing plants sub-divide the garden into different areas. These plant dividers lend structure to the garden and form partial screens that offer tempting glimpses through to the rest of the garden, encouraging further exploration. Gravel paths wind through the space connecting areas to each other.
Plants and flowers have always attracted Penny. She trained at the school of renowned florist Constance Spry, and she’s applied the principles of floristry to her garden, albeit it on a larger scale, using her knowledge of colour and shape. “My planting is incredibly relaxed, but I can get away with it because the structure is there. Getting the bones right is important, and then it looks good all year round,” she explains.
