Magic in Maidenhead: An English Garden That Glows in the Winter

When Sarah Pajwani and her family moved into their house near Maidenhead (an hour from London) in 2011, it was surrounded by an “overgrown field.” Having created a design rationale with the help of professional landscapers, Sarah set about filling her garden with plants of her choice, border by border. Despite her best efforts, in winter she would gaze out of the windows and still feel that there was nothing to look at.

Now, every garden-facing room in the house frames a different aspect of the winter scene, and the house has a lot of windows. Dare we suggest that winter is the garden’s best season? We can report that Saint Timothee, as it is called, was the first garden of the year to be open for the National Garden Scheme and Sarah gave us a tour.

Read on for 11 clever design ideas from Sarah to make the garden glow in the winter:

Photography by Britt Willoughby Dyer, for Gardenista.

1. Red Twig Dogwood

A row of glowing red Cornus sanginea &#8\2\16;Midwinter Fire&#8\2\17; brings out the best in Euphorbia characias subsp. wulfenii. Famously vivid in spring, the euphorbia holds on to its structure and excellent leaf color in winter. — Above: A row of glowing red *Cornus sanginea* ‘Midwinter Fire’ brings out the best in *Euphorbia characias* subsp. *wulfenii.* Famously vivid in spring, the euphorbia holds on to its structure and excellent leaf color in winter.

Saint Timothee is a picture of 1930s gentility, with an Enid Blyton kind of name. Yet the garden is not in a time warp. Sarah uses colorful stems, scented shrubs (such as Lonicera fragrantissima, Viburnum x bodnantese ‘Dawn’, Sarcococca confusa), sparsely flowering trees (Prunus x subhirtella ‘Autumnalis’) as well as grasses mixed with evergreens to brighten the winter scene. Several paths and borders lead the eye from one of the inside windows, across the garden.