Emily Barnes

My role includes consulting, creating, and bringing to life gorgeous garden design concepts and planting schemes.

I’m an aesthetically obsessive person who appreciates ALL the details! My professional background includes decorative arts, event styling and graphic design. Whilst on maternity leave and spending much of my free time in the garden, I decided to retrain and become a garden designer. I graduated university in 2019 with a degree in Horticulture and in the same year created a show garden at RHS Chatsworth which is were I met Lee.

I feel very lucky to have discovered a calling that enables me to enrich both the environment and people’s lives with the outdoor spaces we design and create at Bestall & Co. Of the many things I love about garden design, the most important one for me is the power it has to create a space that connects and grounds us and the positive impact a garden can bring to our hectic modern lives. We humans have evolved with an inbuilt biophilic response to the natural world, and being immersed in a beautiful outdoor space is so good for mind, body and soul. It is also very pleasant to look at through the window!

My hobbies and interests revolve around a desire to create a considered and healthful life. I enjoy making art, gardening, visiting gardens, wild swimming and having as many adventures as I can. I’m always on the hunt for inspiration and my dream is to explore a wide variety of natural landscapes and cultures around the world.

If I wasn’t a garden designer, I would most likely be an artist and run a cute B&B by the sea as I love to play hostess!

If I had to list three desert island essentials, they would be a boat, my family and a nice villa.

If I could choose anyone to play me in a film of my life it would be Emma Watson, whom I admire for her work on women’s rights and her unapologetic sense of self.

I very much hope we will meet one day to discuss all things garden and plants, but until then I will leave you with a joke and some plant trivia.

What did 0 say to 8? – “Hey, nice belt!”

Hydrangea, Hellebore and Cornus kousa are widely grown for their long-lasting, showy flowers which are actually not flowers botanically speaking, but modified leaves called bracts. They have the same function as a petal – acting as a homing-beacon to attract pollinating insects. If you look closely, you will see the actual flowers are tiny and quite insignificant, grouped together in the centre. The bracts last much longer than petals and go through some wonderful colour changes as they age. A nice addition to your garden!