Photographed late in its first summer, this garden and roof terrace was designed for a young professional who was just completing an extensive and innovative renovation of his Victorian terrace house. He had installed a hot tub and now wanted an intimate and private garden to compliment his home and to chill in and have fun with friends.

The design is based on a modern ‘parterre’ using staggered and balanced rectangles to encase the hot tub, offer a dog legged walkway to ‘secret’ seating and envelope the whole in planting.

A grey polished concrete terrace extends at one level from the kitchen to the terrace. Decked boardwalks and seating in the garden and roof terrace reflect wooden floors throughout the house and step up in the garden to help ‘settle’ the hot tub. Black metal planters echo cladding on the house – pulling house and garden together. The three-dimensionality of planters and trees envelope the hot tub and seating area to offer privacy. Contemporary and luxurious black metal furniture is used in the garden and the roof terrace to pull both together and to be practically movable for extra guests. All shrouded in soft and naturalistic planting to feel cocooned and transported from the city and the demands of a busy working life.