Garden Design & Planting Consultations
At Preston Bissett Nurseries & Country Shop, we offer a full garden design service to help you transform your garden into a space that enchants & inspires.
We can produce masterplans, working drawings and planting plans to meet your specific requirements and from initial consultation through to construction, we will provide expert advice and support to ensure the entire process runs smoothly.
We also offer a planting consultation service with a horticultural advisor, to help you create beautiful borders, select the best trees for screening, or find simple solutions for those difficult to manage areas.
We are able to cover Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire.
Garden Design Process
Getting Started
Each new project begins with a personal consultation and site visit – a chance for us to understand your vision and aspirations for the garden. From there, we tailor our approach to meet your specific needs, whether you’re seeking an idyllic space for family enjoyment, a tranquil retreat, or a refined setting for social gatherings. We collaborate with you at every stage, ensuring that your new garden harmonizes with your home’s character and reflects the beauty of the surrounding landscape. With carefully chosen plants and materials, we craft a garden that will enchant and inspire throughout the year. The initial consultation will be followed up with a brief and fee proposal.
Measuring Up
We will measure up the site, taking numerous photographs and producing a survey that records the positions of existing structures, trees, utilities and changes in level. On larger sites we commission a surveyor to make a detailed topographical site survey. These surveys are crucial to the success of the design ensuring that base details are accurate for you.
Design Concept
Drawing from the insights gained during our meeting and site survey, we begin crafting a bespoke design proposal for your garden. We anticipate that this design will evolve as we continue our dialogue with you, allowing your vision to unfold naturally. Once we have finalised the garden design and the concept is perfect for you we can then follow with the planting design, lighting design and any other design detailing required as well as considering materials.
Building Your Garden
If you need help building the garden once it is planned we can connect you to specialist landscape contractors who can deliver your garden build to a high standard using quality, sustainable materials.
Planting Consultation Process
Take the guesswork out of planting and create a garden that thrives with expert guidance from our highly experienced Garden Design Team.
We will start with a site visit, where we will:
- walk through your garden together to discuss goals and planting possibilities
- advise on border sizes, layout ideas, screening, and any tricky areas
- note any soil improvement or irrigation needs (with follow-up guidance emailed afterwards)
The Heart Of The Service Is The Next Step
A visit to our Nurseries accompanied by a consultant to select plants that will be suited to your space, soil, and the environment. This ensures you get bespoke and expert-led choices that thrive in your garden.
Once your plants are chosen, we will provide advice on planting layout here at The Nurseries which will give you a clear, practical guide for planting focused on stock you have chosen with us.
Projects may be delivered in two phases:
- Preparation & planning (site visit + soil/irrigation/preparation guidance)
- Plant selection & plant layout advice (once borders are ready and stock is in season)
This is a planting advice only service and does not include a full garden design or extensive consultation report. Please refer to our Garden Design Service if your project is more complex. With our friendly horticultural expertise you will set your garden up for lasting success and enjoy a planting scheme that is practical, beautiful, and ready to thrive.
Some of Our Projects
Planting Consultation
Urban planting scheme
Planting Consultation
Long boundary border
Garden Design
Family entertaining
Planting Consultation
Summer showstopper
Garden Design
Wildlife Friendly Garden
Tina James MSGD
Garden designer
I am a registered member of the Society of Garden Designers and have been a professional garden designer for over 16 years. I have been fortunate to work on gardens from tiny city courtyards to large country estates. I have a wealth of industry experience in creating gardens and I will always take a pragmatic approach.
I will listen to your ideas and aspirations whilst considering the layout, geography, aspect, proposed use, and maintenance. These points infirm the process and are used to create a beautiful garden design, a unique space for you to experience the restorative effect of being immersed in nature.
I like to create gardens that are in harmony with their surroundings by prescribing a restrained palette of natural materials from the local environment. I aim to connect the house to the landscape and strive to create timeless spaces
Jarka Valasheek
Garden Designer
Jarka chose horticulture and garden design as part of a career change that took her from the world of art and architecture into the world of gardens. Jarka is not only a qualified designer, having achieved RHS Level 2 Diploma, and currently studying a Postgraduate Diploma in Garden Design she is also Preston Bissett Nurseries head plant buyer. With an eye for seasonal colour across all of the ranges and an in-depth knowledge of new and exciting varieties Jarkas eye is one of the very best within the industry.
Jarka has designed many successful planting schemes that her clients enjoy. She has a particular interest in biodiversity and blending formal aspects of garden design with naturalistic planting. With an eye for art and design, Jarka was involved in projects that took her to work on winning show gardens of recent years at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show.
Enquiry Form
If you are interested in either a garden design or planting consultation, please fill in this form and we will contact you to provide any further information you need and hopefully book a consultation appointment with you. Please include any site photographs, surveys or plans you have to give us an understanding of your project.
