Page 70 Daily Mail, Friday, August 23, 2019Property Mail
KENT
£595,000
YORKSHIRE BERKSHIRE
ON THE MARKET... with glorious gardens
COACH House Mews is in
the Great Maytham Hall
Estate near Cranbrook.
No 5 has three bedrooms
surrounded by 17 acres of
land which inspired the
book The Secret Garden.
O Knightfrank.co.uk,
01892 882 682.BUILT in 1846, Headingley
Castle is just outside
Leeds and has extensive
landscaped grounds. This
two-bedroom flat also
has a third of an acre fruit
and vegetable garden.
O Hunters.com,
0113 323 7720.SET within several acres
of communal grounds
backing onto woodland,
this Grade II-listed house
has two bedrooms.
Windsor is a ten-minute
drive away.
O Struttandparker.com,
01753 257 217.£280,000 £885,000
Manicured grounds: A first-floor apartment with 1.5 acres of shared gardens is for sale at The Leazes in NorthumberlandINTERIORS – Page 72
G
ARDEN-lovers wax lyrical
about the joy of a manicured
lawn and neatly layered
flower beds; garden-haters
resent every hour they giveto keeping their scruffy plot in order.
Yet there is a compromise that could
bring these two tribes together — a
communal garden.
Buy into a housing development with shared
gardens and you never again have to face the
horror of a jungle to be cleared when you
return from holiday. All is kept in order by
someone else. Little wonder they are popular
with owners of expensive new homes.
The gardens of the Star And Garter
development on Richmond Hill are a prime
example. The neo-classical building itself
was opened by King George V in 1924 as a
home for soldiers injured in the Great War. In
2013 it was acquired by developers, London
Square, who built apartments and houses
ranging in price from £600,000 to £8.5 million
(londonsquare.co.uk).
To match the swish facilities — including a
pool, spa and cinema — the property has
communal gardens with a cherub-ringed
fountain. The residents don’t get the chance
to colonise too much of the grounds. The
open areas are for everyone, but anyone wish-
ing to book a barbecue area for a private
function can do so through the concierge.
‘It’s an ideal arrangement,’ says Rebecca
Little, sale and marketing director of London
Square. ‘Our residents often travel widely
throughout the year and they cannot commit
themselves to gardening.’
Buying a property with communal^ gardens
isn’t entirely straightforward and there arestories of residents being landed with
suddenly inflated management fees.
‘The key to buying successfully is
engagement,’ says James Greenwood of
Stacks property Search. ‘Join any
committee that oversees the grounds and
study its budget and future plans to
ensure you aren’t going to be asked to pay
for any over-ambitious improvements.’
Splendid communal gardens are not
solely the preserve of the uber rich. Royal
Earlswood Park in Redhill, Surrey, is
surrounded by 97 acres of parkland.
The entrance drive is guarded by a
phalanx of Redwood trees; deer roam the
grounds in the early morning and the area
around the pond is a particular favourite
with picnicking families.
‘We are happy to stay here in our two-
bedroom flat — even with a one-year old
child,’ said one resident. ‘The grounds are
so spacious we don’t feel the need to move
to a bigger place.’T
HERE are several apartments
for sale in Royal Earlswood
Park, which also has a resident’s
pool and gym. A two-bedroom
flat on the second floor is for sale with
Connells for £265,000 (connells.co.uk).
Near Hexham in Northumberland, at the
Grade-II listed country home The Leazes,
which has shared gardens covering
1.5 acres, a three-bedroom flat is for sale
at £450,000 (struttandparker.com).
There are some 27 million gardeners in
the UK and some of these are attracted to
communal gardens because they offer the
chance to practise their horticultural skills
on a broader canvas. Many of the bigcountry houses allow residents to help
their team of gardeners informally, while
the Marmalade Lane co-housing group in
Cambridge offers residents the opportunity
to join a group of eco-friendly gardeners.
‘We have a large meadow bordered by
oaks and maples, with mowed strips which
we use for picnics,’ Jan Chadwick, 67, one
of the 100 or so adults who live on the site.
‘We have a herb garden for the bees and
grow courgettes, squashes and tomatoes.
‘There’s no compulsion to work on the
land, but once a year there’ll be a shout
out for help mowing and raking and then
everyone joins in. It’s good fun.’
Prices in Marmalade Lane range from
£295,000 for a one-bedroom flat to £535,000
for a four-bedroom house (savills.com).
Research from Barratt found that 82 per
cent of buyers are more likely to buy in an
area that incorporates green space, hence
house builders offering imaginative
showpiece communal gardens incorpo-
rated into their developments.
Galliard Homes has a Zen Garden,
designed as a Japanese dry rock garden,
in its Islington Square development and
the Co-op scheme in Coventry has an
indoor landscaped garden.
‘The grass is artificial, but the trees and
plants are real,’ says Dipak Ghedia, 40,
who lives in one of the 63 apartments
priced from £165,000 (connells.co.uk).
‘With the wind blowing around the glass
roof, you’d swear you were outdoors. It’s a
truly relaxing environment.’FRED REDWOOD
Communal gardens
offer year-round joys
without having to worry
about the upkeep...
PLOT A LAZY FUTURE