Following the success at BBC Gardener’s World Live 2024, little interviews goes “live at Gardeners’ world” to catch up with some of the garden designers that Pro Landscaper has been following throughout their design journey.

Winning gold, the Lunatica Garden was designed by Joshua Fenton in response to the climate crisis. It explores how UK gardeners can rethink rainwater use and how individuals can play a role in addressing the national water crisis regarding sewage overflows and water scarcity.

Name: Joshua Fenton 

Job: Garden designer 

Company: Fenton Gardens 

Garden: Lunatica 

What was the inspiration behind this garden? 

The inspiration came from my recent move on to a boat. Suddenly we needed a water tank, we had to fill up and empty a composting toilet, and all with the tide lifting us twice a day. It just got me thinking a lot about water conservation and the impact of the moon on large bodies of water on this planet, and this garden tries to embody these features and offer some solutions. 

What are the water solutions installed within this garden? 

We’ve broken the design into five solutions. We have green roofs, which slow down and help in capturing water. We have a plunge pool which doubles up as a reservoir, which we use to top up the lower planting beds. And then the upper beds are drought-tolerant, which also free drain into the lower beds and the reservoir, which helps fill the composting toilet. This is helping to save a huge amount of water and stops the patio from acting as a water catchment zone. Using permeable patios are great because you’re just putting it straight back into the water table, but at the same time, we can use a patio as if it were a roof to harvest rainwater and then reuse it later.  

What challenges did you have to overcome? 

The big challenge was the roof over the plunge pool. It has been a real pain to get it right and to build over the top of everything, especially when you’re trying to ensure everything is level standing on three legs. Everything else was within our wheelhouse but that and the building the circular building was tricky. I’ve definitely learned a lot from doing this garden and now know that I could have done it differently. 

If you were to do it again, is there anything you would change? 

Would build around a form with a circular building. I’ve built off a particular angle that I pre decided using mathematic formula, but it was incredibly difficult. In hindsight I should have just created a basic form to work from and then used cladding like you would with any other building. But I wanted to make sure that the gaps are as close as possible following the angle.