Carolyn Hughes, Author at WM Design Studio LTD

Extrospective influence by Michael John McGarr

Talking about extrospective influence

by Michael John McGarrI did a talk to a group of garden design students recently where I spoke about extrospective influence. This is something I truly believe makes me a better designer, and overall, better at the creative process.So what is extrospective influence?For me, it's using any medium of art to gain creative influence, and to spark off a chain of thoughts and ideas, which culminate in a theme or concept, which is then workable into a new client brief.Although I am passionate about garden and landscape design and ecology, I rarely read garden design or landscape magazines

Categories: Advice and tips, Garden design, landscape architecture, Landscape design, Michael John McGarr
November 1st 2018

Warnes McGarr & Co at The Landscape Show

By Michael McGarrWe were really honoured to be asked to speak at the Landscape Show which takes place in London on Wednesday, September 18 and Thursday, September 19. This is one of the biggest exhibitions for the garden and landscape design industry, so we are thrilled to be heading down to the big smoke next week.We will be sitting on a panel on the Wednesday, hosted by the brilliant London College of Garden Design, entitled How to shake up your garden design. Our landscape design and garden design always pushes the boundaries with creativity and innovative new technologies, so we

Categories: Business news, Landscape design, Michael John McGarr
September 11th 2018

RHS Tatton Cheshire - Poisonous Garden Warnes McGarr & Co

The Poisonous Garden planting list

RHS Tatton 2018 in Cheshire launched today, so we were incredibly pleased to present The Poisonous Garden. It was amazing to see crowds of people flowing in when the gates opened at 10am - this might be the busiest year that we've seen yet.We've been planning this design for the best part of 2018, and it's taken us a really long time to find just the right suppliers and the right materials. At 650 sq m, this is a huge project so it was worth every second taken to get it looking perfect.Here is the extensive planting list for the

Categories: Cheshire, Garden design, Landscape design, Manchester, Michael John McGarr, RHS Tatton, Show gardens
July 18th 2018

The Poisonous Garden RHS Tatton Warne McGarr and Co

Building The Poisonous Garden

This week we started on site managing the build of the Poisonous Garden - the pretty large and high profile exhibit for this year's RHS Tatton Flower Show.After three years of creating award-winning show gardens at RHS Tatton, which takes place at Tatton Park in Cheshire, we did look at designing something for other RHS shows. However, in January this year, we were asked by the brilliant RHS events team if we would design the Poisonous Garden. It seems they like what we've been doing and we were honoured to be asked to partner up with them.So, after months and

Categories: Business news, Cheshire, Garden design, landscape architecture, Landscape design, Manchester, Michael John McGarr, RHS Tatton, Show gardens
July 6th 2018

Pro Landscaper Manchester Warnes McGarr & Co

More coverage in ProLandscaper – Manchester supplement

One of our favourite trade mags, ProLandscaper, has put together a Manchester supplement for their April issue, which brilliantly features Warnes McGarr & Co landscape and garden designers not once but twice.Our upcoming work with the team at RHS Tatton to design and build The Poisonous Garden for their prestigious Cheshire garden and flower show in July has been featured. As we move into May, we are really ramping up the planning for this amazing huge exhibit!Our garden designer Michael John McGarr was also asked to contribute some thoughts for a feature about the Northern Forest that was announced this

Categories: Business news, Cheshire, Landscape design, Manchester, Michael John McGarr, Press coverage
April 30th 2018

Michael McGarr garden designer The Telegraph

Garden designer Michael McGarr featured in The Telegraph

If you were casually flicking through The Telegraph weekend gardening section over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend, you may have thought - I recognise that face! I recognise that garden full of cacti!Yes, we were featured in a double-page spread this weekend by fantastic garden writer Annie Gatti headlined: Six fresh faces in garden design - how will they change the world? Annie contacted us back in September last year for a chat after we won a gold medal at RHS Tatton 2017, so we've been keeping our eyes out ever since for the resulting feature.It was an honour to

Categories: Business news, Lancashire, Landscape design, Michael John McGarr, Press coverage, RHS Tatton
April 6th 2018

Creating outdoor living spaces that rock and roll!

As former musicians, who still play in their spare time, garden and landscape designers Michael and Rob like bringing their rock and roll approach to re-designing their clients' outdoor living spaces.By Michael McGarrAs a qualified garden designer and ecologist, I believe our outdoor living spaces should do five things. These are:- Take no effort to look after - Encourage wildlife - Produce food - Look amazing - Be an extension of your indoor living space and style This is my starting point for working with clients and for taking a look at how they want to use their space. This

Categories: Advice and tips, Garden design, landscape architecture, Landscape design, Michael John McGarr, Outdoor kitchens, Residential garden, RHS Tatton
March 29th 2018

Best of Houzz 2018 award winner Warnes McGarr & Co

More awards from Houzz

2018 has got off to a busy start for our team here at Warnes McGarr & Co. Not only have we just announced our design project for RHS Tatton - The Poisonous Garden - we're incredibly busy working on residential garden designs right across Lancashire, Bolton and Wigan and Cheshire at the moment.On top of that, we've also been awarded TWO awards in the Best of Houzz 2018. We won one award for Best of Houzz Design and another for Best of Houzz Service.The Design award reflects the quality of our work and the images that we've uploaded to our

Categories: Awards, Bolton, Business news, Cheshire, Garden design, Lancashire, Michael John McGarr, Wigan
March 7th 2018

Warnes McGarr The Poisonous Garden RHS Tatton 2018

Announcing The Poisonous Garden

by Michael John McGarrWe are immensely pleased and excited to announce that Warnes McGarr & Co will be designing and project-managing the Poisonous Garden in association with The RHS for the Tatton Flower in July.After three award-winning years of designing show gardens - including last year's gold-award winning 2101 garden - we're really honoured to be asked back again to design this large visitor attraction.RHS Tatton in Knutsford, Cheshire is also celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2018 so it really is going to be an exciting year.About The Poisonous GardenThe garden will be an exhibition in all that is

Categories: Business news, Cheshire, Michael John McGarr, RHS Tatton, Show gardens
March 1st 2018

The ultimate guide to creating a rain garden

Rain gardens are becoming more and more important to include with garden and landscape design across the UK, as well as new house building, right from the off-set. The results of climate change mean warmer but wetter weather, so managing excess rainwater and flooding has never been more important or relevant.Why are rain gardens so important?A rain garden is one that is designed to spread rain run-off and excess water to reduce pooling in one area and to slow down the movement of rainwater to reduce flash flooding.Plants are key here, and perform the function of slowing rainfall across the

Categories: Advice and tips, Cheshire, Garden design, Landscape design, Michael John McGarr, rain gardens, Residential garden
October 25th 2017

Our garden design case study in ProLandscaper

Our whole team was incredibly chuffed to receive the October issue of ProLandscaper and find a photo of our '2101' Cheshire show garden on the front cover.In this month's issue of the landscaping magazine, there is a three-page feature talking about the build of our Cactus Direct 2101 show garden, at RHS Tatton in July 2017.And then towards the end of the magazine is a book review by our lead garden designer Michael John McGarr who reviewed Dan Pearson's Natural Selection: A Year in the Garden book while he was on holiday.Make sure you read the October 2017 ProLandscaper.

Categories: Business news, Cheshire, Garden design, Michael John McGarr, Press coverage, Show gardens
October 25th 2017

Michael John McGarr being interviewed for The Sod Show

Interview on The Sod Show

While at RHS Tatton in July this year exhibiting our multi award-winning garden, our garden designer Michael John McGarr was interviewed by Peter Donegan from The Sod Show.We were already aware of fellow garden designer Pete's brilliant podcasts, so were honoured to be chosen to be featured. Michael had a great chat with Pete about setting up his own consultancy, the pressures of following your own creative path and designing and building show gardens.Take a listen to The Sod Show podcast below and you can always drop them a line on Twitter @sodshow to let them know you enjoyed it.

Categories: Business news, Cheshire, Garden design, Michael John McGarr, Press coverage, RHS Tatton
October 5th 2017

Warnes McGarr & Co. Landscape Design.

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Based on 10 reviews

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Patrick Gormley

16:52 22 Feb 21

WM Design Studio completed a large landscaping project for us at our previous house. They managed the project from... initial design through to build completion. Throughout the process they delighted us from a design that was both sympathetic to the wider area but also blended with our new home extension. They were professional, friendly and respectful during the build and minimised the disruption associated with a large build project. My wife and I were thrilled with the end results and I would have no hesitation in recommending.read more

Christine Burke

13:23 07 Jan 19

WM Design Studio is a very professional company. Everyone we worked with were intelligent and professional. The design... ideas involved things we wouldn't have been able to think of ourselves and included levelling and transformation of a wasteland at the back. As it was a big project for us there were bound to be minor issues and these were all resolved in a timely and professional manner. The budget was negotiated fairly and the work done was of a high quality. It was worth paying for good workmanship and excellent knowledge in all aspects of our garden design and construction.read more

beccy weeks

06:11 24 Dec 18

We had no idea what potential our garden kept hidden as a secret. These guys design unlocked the potential by... designing a living space that matched exactly what we wanted and kept the theme of our house extension running through the garden to the very end. We are really pleased with the design and the pragmatism around staging the delivery to give us exactly what we want. I would recommend to anyone wanting an amazing outdoor living space!!read more

Mike leary

09:48 20 Dec 18

Michael of WM design studio has been instrumental to gaining planning permission on my project. His industry knowledge... and anticipation of what was required have delivered a scheme which fulfils all the requirements of not only myself as the client but also of a very particular design review panel. Recommend without hesitation!read more

Carolyn Hughes

16:38 19 Apr 18

Having worked with WM Design Studio, I am constantly impressed with Michael's creativity, dedication and... professionalism.read more

Norman Willson

20:16 16 Mar 16

"Many thanks to the team--especially Rob --who did a very professional job. Everything looks fine and I am busy... planting out in the new beds.” Norman Willsonread more

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