Sheena Patterson of Oxford Garden Design is looking middle-aged

Last year the OGD team was contacted about re-designing a very special garden.

The project was to make a medieval garden for the back of a stunning converted barn, which dates back to the 11th century. So, I have been looking at the Middle Ages and, in case you were wondering, this column is not about the latest Botox treatment (not yet anyway).

Over the last few weeks The Boys have taken over the site and got stuck in with some heavy-duty demolition work. No matter how much they love creating a garden – and they really do love it – there is nothing they actually love more than getting seriously down and dirty.

Dear reader, the weather wasn’t always kind to us, and sometimes there was more mud on The Boys than there was in the garden as they hoiked out old plants, weeds and rubble – adding a new, and somewhat filthy, dimension to the wet T-shirt look.

Anyway, in no time at all The Boys had wreaked their magic and the garden was a blank canvas. Now for the exciting part. The planting.

We started with the structural plants, the trees, with some bare root pleached hornbeam trees. If possible, it’s always much better to plant deciduous trees in winter while they are dormant, they are better value for money and because they aren’t pot-bound can get their roots in the ground more quickly ready for summer growth.

We are particularly proud of the key feature of the garden, the medieval herb wheel, which contains some unusual varieties that would have been used by medieval monks.

For example, borage, which was prescribed as a sort of medieval Prozac: “The leaves and floures of borage put into wine make men and women glad and merry, driving away all sadness, dulness, and melancholy”. (Overlooking the obvious, that it could have been the wine that was making the men and women merry.) Today, it isn’t much different, as borage is my herb of choice for a long, refreshing glass of Pimms, medicinal of course, and best taken before meals, outdoors in the sunshine. Thyme is a more familiar herb and found in many modern gardens too. According the Benedictine abbess Hildegard of Bingen in the 12th century, an ointment made with thyme can be applied to relieve afflictions as varied as leprosy, palsy, and lice.

While old and rheumy eyes benefit from merely staring at thyme until the eyes water; this cleans and purifies them.

In the first century AD, Greek herbalist and “master of pharmacy” Dioscorides mentions thyme for breathing troubles and women’s complaints and as an ointment for skin troubles. Obviously, he had never heard of Pimms or Botox!