Underlying philosophies

         Listening in depth to our clients

         Developing designs from the heart

         Creating the right ambience for each client and

         Attention to detail

Jacquie Chirgwin is owner and principal designer of Hope & Heart Garden Design. She trained in garden design at Burnley Horticultural College (University of Melbourne), and has designed and cared for gardens of all types in the Melbourne region and in the UK for more than 30 years. She has also worked for many years as an Oncologist caring for women with breast cancer. This has led to her interest in designing healing gardens which make a difference to health, wellbeing and quality of life.

Hope & Heart Garden Design are a specialized boutique garden design service with our own distinct philosophy and a personalised and friendly approach. Jacquie will focus on getting to know a bit about how you and your family or community 'tick', and will carefully explore with you, your ideas and vision for the garden. She will also make a careful assessment of the site looking for its opportunities and discovering the problems which require solutions. Her focus is to develop a garden that uplifts and nurtures you, fulfils your vision and considers the opportunities and challenges of the site. She will be able to discuss ideas and options for your consideration, with the aim of creating an exceptional garden - something that really works for you and that you will want to spend time in. Gardens are all about how they make you feel and her aim is to bring you a sense of peace and tranquillity and a beauty that satisfies. She aims to reflect your personal style and taste, to complement your house and surrounding landscape and provide for all your outdoor activities together with places for reflection and healing.

After exploring your preferences and developing the brief for the project she works to combine these with a variety of design elements such as appealing colours and colour harmonies, textural contrasts, aromatic and perfumed plants, the sounds of water and wind, back lighting effects, elegant curves, interesting shapes and patterns, eclectic garden art, striking focal points, borrowed vistas and much more, to create something personal and unique.

With her team, Jacquie can co-ordinate the construction of your garden. This may involve her gardening team for garden renovations and planting and/or a recommended landscape contractor for built elements of the final design. You also have the option of choosing your own contractor or building the garden yourself. In this instance it is a good idea for us to be involved throughout with various aspects such as layout of hard landscaping, requests for changes or additions and plant placement to ensure adherence to the design intent. Of course, carefully considered variation to the original plan is not a problem during the construction phase and often enhances the end result.

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Our aim is to please and to "get the job done". As we are committed to providing our services to a wide range of people including those with small budgets, we strive to make our fees affordable, and in some cases discounts are available. In the case of community projects we may be able to assist in identifying funding sources.