In my garden it should smell of lavender, grown in long rows. The plants should seldom be trimmed so that they get really old and bushy, so my hands can easily reach them to release the fragrance. There should be ivy that beds in and climbs above the windows. I want blue flowers - aconite, salvia, scilla and forget-me-not. Wormwood should be there with its grey green colour, and honeysuckle like in old gardens. There should be wide and narrow gravel paths to walk on in my garden. And sometimes you will have to go round and jump over so you don’t trample the cress that spills over all the borders. 

In the beds there will be sunflowers for all the bumble bees to sleep in, paths and round beds will be edged with hostas, ostrich ferns, orpine and lyme grass. There must be Roman snails in the garden so you can see them open out their ruffled skirts when they move around.  

In my garden nothing should be too fancy, so that other things don’t feel welcome. The garden will be fragrant, children will play and be able to climb and hide themselves, look and smell, ask questions and be amazed. 

A flower bed should be round but not too round, with a bird bath in the centre for bathing birds and thirsty butterflies. When you bend over it you should be able to see yourself mirrored and laugh with the sky as background. In my garden wooden barrels will be overflowing with rainwater, with elderflower and yellow balls of flowering tall rudbeckia growing next to them. 

There will be lots of small animals in my garden. There should be room for bumble bees and other bees, and ants and frogs. Birds should feel welcome - robins, flycatchers and starlings in birdboxes, and wrens building their nests in the stone cairn. On the grass at the back of the house there’ll be an open gate, and everyone will ask what on earth that’s there for? “Nothing at all”, I’ll say. “Just for fun.”

In my garden there will always be so many flowers that I could pick a bouquet every single day if I wanted. And everything that grows will have a story to tell and a lovely name. Bleeding heart, forget-me-not, scented violets and drooping star of Bethlehem, come and be in my garden. There’ll be masses of lilac and white painted garden furniture where we’ll sit and have coffee with biscuits. When the lilac smells heavenly, when the nights are balmy, and no one wants to go in. 

I want doves in my garden, white ones and grey with a blue shimmer, which will fly in and sit on the roof ridge. There will be green painted ladders in the trees and moss on the stones, and white corydalis growing next to them. I will be able to see, from the kitchen window, when the cherry blossom flowers and imagine them as wings in the tree. And I will always be by your side.

With love, Christian.