Why Winter is the best time to renovate your gardenSouth Africans love being in the garden in summer; but right now, it is mid-winter; and in the Western Cape it is freezing outside and it has been raining for weeks. Our gardens are drenched and forlorn. We’d all...

THE PARADISE OF EXOTIC MOROCCO AT THE FOOT OF TABLE MOUNTAIN By Lucy Schnell – Landscape Designer, Contours Design StudioYou would never have guessed it, but tucked behind a high wall in the City of Cape Town suburb of Gardens, just below the flank of Table Mountain...

It’s a wonderful sunny weekend morning, you’ve been up early and that itch to work in the garden and spruce up your beds needs to be scratched. You patiently wait for your partner to wake up or best friend to get to you because today you are going to your local plant...

5 STEPS TO TURN YOUR GARDEN INTO A VIBRANT OUTDOOR SPACE TO ENJOYWhen you think about your garden, what is the first emotion it provokes? If it's shame and discontent, don’t worry, we’re here to help to set your garden and yourself up for success. If you are happy...

15 Minutes with Lucy Schnell, CDS landscape designer ON BEING A LANDSCAPER, AND GETTING LOST IN A WORLD OF EARTH, PLANTS, LIGHT AND WATER. Landscape design is defined by ScienceDirect as the art and science of arranging land so as to adapt it most conveniently,...

THE LEGALITY OF TREES by Mark Mac HattieYou’ve been staring at it for months, your partner has asked you to get it sorted and you have been putting it off because you don’t know what the right thing is to do anymore. You are perplexed, confused and to be honest, a...

DOES LANDSCAPING INCREASE PROPERTY VALUE? FEATURING LUKE CARLINO AND URBAN.COM.AU   Property owners. You may have asked the question, does landscaping really increase the value of your property? The answer is a profound yes. Landscaping is one of the best things a...

LANDSCAPE DESIGN OR ARCHITECTURE? How do you choose a contractor? Ah! The big question! Who do you need to contract to help plan and install an outdoor space that is meant to make humans - you! - feel comfortable to relax and move around in? While both careers...

The very term “maintenance” in the context of a garden is somewhat of a misnomer. It is no wonder that people are led up the proverbial garden path only to find at the end of the expense that the outcome is not what they thought it would be. Instead, the garden is...

Deaf Ears Alley links the fynbos, pool-side section of my compact garden to the salad patch outside my kitchen door. The alley, always in the shade, was named by my wife, Jackie. This is what happened: I asked Jackie what I should plant in the shade that would grow...

10 PLANTS THAT CAN KILL YOUR PETS Article by Mark Mac Hattie You come home after a long day and open your door to a scene reminiscent of a horror movie. It looks like the undead has risen in your home, soil is scattered everywhere, bits of plants all around the room,...

Most of us that have been given the gift of sight experience something so unique to our existence, it’s hard to fathom a world without it. It is also something most of us don’t actively notice and just go about our day as normal, but without this perception...

Our approach celebrates the individual personalities and interests of our clients while being sensitive to their taste, their homes, buildings, and the surrounding environment. Call us! Our design team is standing by for your next outdoor design project. Contours...

Ronel Cockett builds life-like pictures that sell dreams. In this case, the dreams of homemakers who are eager to turn their investments into green garden-sanctuaries. To become a draughtsperson, you are required to have excellent mathematical and analytical skills,...

It's winter time and you’re happy to curl up next to the fire, read a book, sip on that glass of wine and live your best winter lifestyle. But you’ve noticed that your house plants aren’t doing too great. Some of them have dropped their leaves, others seem to be...

In 2020, we have learnt to quickly adapt our public spaces to a concept known as social distancing. This has been accomplished with the simplest of tools, requiring no construction and bypassing all laws and regulations of spatial usage normally imposed by governance....

All good design matters. It is so deeply ingrained in our psyche that it can become difficult to pin it down, but let’s have a go at being more objective about it. Humans are designed to change their environment. It is written in our DNA. People do not have large,...

Imagine having to fit the entire contents and experience of a large packet of Smarties into one of those teeny tiny packets. The full volume of sweets; the full adventure that is packed into the deluxe box; the delicious anticipation that starts with the explosion of...

As the claustrophobia of the lockdown begins to close in on us with restrictions preventing so many healthy outdoor activities, the value of our gardens as a place to reconnect with nature has become increasingly important.According to a leading UK-based psychiatrist,...

From backyard to bonsai, patio to planter, hidden corner to driveway verge, small gardens are as much a state of mind as a definition of size. A small garden can be a selection of pots and planters in the corner of the stoep, or a small English garden next to a...

When we first viewed this site, we could not actually see the earth upon which we were treading. The plants ‘in residence’ had been left to have the proverbial party. With plenty to drink (in spite of the recent drought), and undisturbed by the gardener’s sheers, they...

Society has always proven its resilience in times of crisis, very much as is the case now that we are all faced with the COVID-19 pandemic that is affecting every nation on earth. The fear of gathering in large groups, panic buying and the uncertainty of ‘normality’...

Week 3 of lockdown… Your work and home wardrobes have fused to become a hybrid of business on the top and comfort on the bottom, breakfast can be eaten any time of the day and a box of easter eggs will be served as a meal at some point. But hopefully, through all this...

Yes, even with 2020 vision, no-one could have predicted that most of us would be in a forced time-out in order to save thousands of lives from a threat that resembles the flu. Isn’t it funny how mother nature can make us sit in the corner and think about what we’ve...

The longest month of the year has come and gone but many of us still feel the pinch of the new-year-new-decade. It is a great time to start looking at ways to save money and, low and behold, you can save a Randela or two by changing up your patio or indoor plant game...

  Don’t you just love those beautiful green babies you get to buy at nurseries and markets? The cute little Philodendrons, Calatheas and rubber trees. They are photo-ready and look amazing on your window sill and desk and you just love the fact that they fit,...