Gertrude Jekyll (1843-1932) stands as one of the most influential figures in garden design history, whose artistic vision and horticultural knowledge transformed the English garden landscape.
Her innovative approach to colour, plant combinations, and garden structure created a lasting legacy that continues to inspire garden designers worldwide.
Through her prolific writing and over 400 garden designs, Gertrude Jekyll helped shape the Arts and Crafts movement in garden design in England and established principles that remain relevant more than a century later.
Featured Image: “Hestercombe House Gardens” by ripplestone review is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0
Early Life and Artistic Foundations
Born into a prosperous family in London in 1843, Gertrude Jekyll enjoyed a privileged upbringing that nurtured her artistic sensibilities.
Her family moved to Surrey when she was five, where her childhood was spent exploring the countryside, developing a deep appreciation for native plants and natural landscapes. This early connection with nature would later inform her distinctive approach to garden design.
Jekyll initially pursued a career in painting, studying at the South Kensington School of Art where she was exposed to the ideas of the Arts and Crafts movement under the influence of William Morris.
This movement, with its emphasis on craftsmanship and traditional skills, would later become evident in her garden designs. She also trained in other artistic disciplines including embroidery, metalwork, and woodwork, demonstrating her versatile creative abilities.
Her artistic career took an unexpected turn when deteriorating eyesight forced her to abandon painting in her early fifties. Rather than viewing this as a limitation, Gertrude Jekyll redirected her artistic energy toward garden design, where she could apply her painter’s understanding of colour harmony on a larger canvas.
Partnership with Edwin Lutyens
Perhaps one of the most fruitful collaborations in landscape design history began in 1889 when Jekyll met the young architect Edwin Lutyens.
Their professional partnership, which lasted for decades, perfectly married Lutyens’ architectural precision with Jekyll’s naturalistic planting style. Together they created dozens of gardens where Lutyens would provide the “bones” of the garden—the terraces, steps, and structures—while Jekyll filled these spaces with carefully orchestrated plant combinations.
Their most famous collaboration was at Hestercombe in Somerset, where the formal garden exemplifies their complementary talents. T
he garden features Lutyens’ geometric stonework softened by Jekyll’s lush plantings, creating a harmony between structure and nature that became their hallmark.
Design Philosophy and Innovation
Gertrude Jekyll revolutionised garden design through her artistic approach to planting.
Drawing on her painter’s training, she treated the garden as a three-dimensional canvas, using plants as her palette. Her signature innovation was the herbaceous border—long stretches of perennial plantings arranged in a carefully orchestrated colour scheme that would evolve throughout the seasons.
Jekyll’s understanding of colour theory informed her distinctive “colour drifts,” where flowers were arranged in gradual progressions of colour, creating visual harmony and a sense of movement through the garden.
She often began with cool colours like blues and purples, transitioning through pinks to warm oranges and yellows, before cooling down again—an approach that reflected her artistic sensitivity to colour relationships.
Beyond aesthetics, Jekyll held practical horticultural knowledge. She championed the use of native plants and understood the importance of considering a plant’s natural habitat when positioning it in a garden. Her designs worked with the environment rather than against it, a philosophy that presaged modern ecological gardening approaches.
Munstead Wood: Gertrude Jekyll’s Laboratory
In 1883, Jekyll purchased land in Godalming, Surrey, where she built her home, Munstead Wood (designed by Lutyens), and developed her most personal garden. This garden became both her living space and experimental laboratory where she tested plant combinations and refined her design principles.
At Munstead Wood, Jekyll created a series of garden rooms, each with its own character and purpose. There was a Spring Garden, July Border, Hidden Garden, and her famous herbaceous borders.
The woodland garden demonstrated her skill at creating naturalistic plantings that mimicked wild landscapes while subtly enhancing their beauty through thoughtful plant selection.
The garden at Munstead Wood embodied Jekyll’s belief that gardens should provide a seamless transition between the architecture of the house and the surrounding landscape. This principle of harmonious integration between built environment and nature remains one of her most enduring contributions to garden design.
Literary Legacy
Jekyll’s influence extends beyond the gardens she designed through her prolific writing career. She authored over fifteen books on gardening and contributed over a thousand articles to publications including Country Life and The Garden. Her writing style combined practical horticultural advice with an artist’s sensitivity to beauty.
Her most famous work, “Colour in the Flower Garden” (1908), crystallised her design philosophy and provided detailed guidance on creating harmonious plant combinations.
Other significant works included “Wood and Garden” (1899) and “Home and Garden” (1900), which drew from her experiences at Munstead Wood.
Through her writing, Jekyll democratised sophisticated garden design principles, making them accessible to home gardeners. Her practical approach emphasised that beautiful gardens could be created even in modest spaces if principles of colour, texture, and seasonal interest were thoughtfully applied.
Gertrude Jekyll Enduring Influence
Gertrude Jekyll’s impact on garden design cannot be overstated. She bridged the Victorian era’s formal gardening traditions and the more naturalistic approaches that would develop in the 20th century. Her colour-themed borders and artistic plant groupings influenced generations of designers, from Vita Sackville-West at Sissinghurst to contemporary designers worldwide.
Jekyll worked well into her eighties, continuing to design gardens and write until her death in 1932. By then, she had designed over 400 gardens in Britain, Europe, and America, though many have been lost to time and changing fashions.
The preservation of her design plans in the collection at the University of California, Berkeley has allowed for the restoration of many of her gardens. Sites like Hestercombe and The Manor House at Upton Grey have been meticulously restored according to her original plans, allowing modern visitors to experience Jekyll’s vision firsthand.
Summing Up
Gertrude Jekyll’s legacy lies not just in the physical gardens she created, but in her holistic approach to garden design that married artistic principles with horticultural knowledge.
Her vision of the garden as a place of beauty, contemplation, and connection with nature continues to resonate with contemporary gardeners and designers.
In an age of increasing environmental awareness, Jekyll’s sensitive approach to working with natural conditions rather than imposing artificial environments seems particularly prescient.
Her life’s work demonstrates how gardens can be both artistically satisfying and ecologically sound, a balance that remains relevant in addressing the gardening challenges of the 21st century.
Martin Cole has been an avid plant lover and gardener for more than 20 years and loves to talk and write about gardening. In 2006 he was a finalist in the BBC Gardener of the Year competition. He is a member of the National dahlia Society.
He previously lived in London and Sydney, Australia, where he took a diploma course in Horticultural studies and is now based in North Berwick in Scotland. He founded GardeningStepbyStep.com in 2012. The website is aimed at everybody who loves plants or has been bitten by the gardening bug and wants to know more.
Gardening Step by Step has been cited by Thompson and Morgan, the UK’s largest mail order plant retailer, as a website that publishes expert gardening content.