Garden City Gem

By late autumn, many gardens are a little lacklustre as herbaceous perennial displays fade and deciduous trees are stripped back to bare bones. Not so at Renata and Colin Hume’s cottage garden, where variegated evergreen foliage, grasses and seedheads, clusters of berries and heritage apple trees infuse the borders with seasonal glory.

The couple bought the property 20 years ago attracted by the history and potential of the cottage and garden, situated on land believed to have originally been part of a large orchard. Renata and Colin’s cottage was one of the first to be built in the newly established Letchworth Garden City as part of a group of 131 dwellings