New beginnings

Walk into Steve Bustin’s garden on a breezily bright day in September and the first thing to hit you, perhaps literally, will be a variegated

Variegated means having leaves or other plant parts with streaks, blotches or patches of different colours. Typically, these would be a combination of two colours, such as green and gold or green and white.

Arundo donax. Given that this is a diminutive plot in the heart of Brighton, the giant reed is a bold choice of plant that says a great deal about the gardener who tends it.

The rest of this tiny space has an equally big impact, from the striking contemporary water feature and greenhouse full of tomatoes to the bright orange chairs around a table covered in pots of aeoniums. Flowerbeds are full of dahlias, Molinia caerulea subsp. arundinacea ‘Transparent’ and Verbena bonariensis, a dwarf waterlily floats in a tiny fish pond, and a collection of spiky but cool architectural plants perches next to a pair of comfy outdoor sofas. It’s a bright, unapologetic combination of flowers and flamboyance. 

Steve's fishpond

That starts to make more sense when you learn that the garden’s creator and owner is Steve Bustin, who is not only a public-speaking coach by profession and a musical improviser in his spare time, but also Chair of the Hardy Plant Society (HPS) – a charity devoted to encouraging the cultivation and conservation of hardy herbaceous perennials through its nationwide network of local groups, specialist plant collections, publications, lectures and garden visits. Steve is a passionate horticulturist and it’s in this very spot that the source of that passion and knowledge is found, for this is the only garden he has owned. “In fact, it was this garden that made me into a gardener,” he says.

Steve and his husband John Williams moved into their newly constructed home 21 years ago and took on a textbook new-build plot consisting of a patch of lawn with a single 17 x 2m bed running down one side. “It just contained a few shrubs and the soil was covered with woodchips,” says Steve. “I decided to try making it a bit more interesting. Gradually, I got bitten by the gardening bug and then it really got out of hand. I filled it with all sorts of exotic plants and signed up for the RHS General Certificate. Through my tutor I found the HPS and gardening began to take over my life.”

Then, six years ago, Steve inherited some money and he and John decided to extend their home. “Building that extension ate up a large part of the garden, turning it into a narrow L-shaped plot and completely changing the space,” says Steve. “It was an extraordinary opportunity – I knew the ground intimately, but suddenly it had become a blank canvas.”

Considering his garden had just reduced in size, Steve’s wish list for the space was extensive. He wanted plenty of plants, of course, but also a garden table, seating, vegetable beds and the sound of running water. “I nearly set it all out myself, but my contractor persuaded me to use a designer and I am so glad I did. Alick Nee from Fern & Pine drew up the plan with a fresh eye that helped me achieve so much more than I could have imagined. He devised the step-over water rill that runs the width of the garden, but probably his masterstroke was to rotate our existing greenhouse through 90 degrees, which allowed us to fit in all the functional elements on my shopping list, divided up by borders that leave me plenty of space for plants.” 

A stepover rill – fed by an elegant wall-mounted water feature – runs the length of the garden

Entering the garden from the street, through a tall black gate, you skirt the sleek, black-clad extension down a bonded gravel path (made with 55,000 recycled drinking straws) lined with shade-loving plants. “In the Side Garden I wanted glaucous plants to sing out against the black cladding. Euphorbia characias ‘Black Pearl’ is a particular winner, because every lime-green flower has a tiny black heart. But I also kept Thalictrum ‘Elin’ from the garden’s previous iteration, and some snowdrops that came from my mother’s garden. Plants are more special when they have connections.”

At the corner of the extension, where it’s lighter, Steve has his greenhouse, flanked on one side by raspberries, rhubarb and stepover apples. On the other side are raised vegetable beds. In this productive area he also has a repurposed shelf unit that functions as a vertical nursery bed, a couple of tiny black sheds and a second-hand steel commercial kitchen unit, complete with sink and storage shelves, which doubles as a potting bench. Everything is highly practical but creatively considered, then swathed in plants so it becomes an ornamental element in this most ornamental of gardens. 

“The bed by the dining table has an intentionally impoverished soil mix and is planted up in my favourite purples and oranges – perovskia, Thalictrum, Salvia nemorosa ‘Caradonna’ and Geum ‘Totally Tangerine’. I always do a planting plan and am quite disciplined about avoiding random purchases.”

If a plant fails to perform as expected, Steve is equally disciplined about taking it out. “I will forever  remember the terracotta incident…” he says, cringing to himself. “I fell in love with the idea of Achillea ‘Terracotta’ and planted lots, but within a week of flowering it changed from a perfect orange to an awful yellow – it had to go.” 

Steve's collection of aeoniums sits with other tender succulents in a summer display on the dining table

Despite his role at the HPS, Steve doesn’t limit himself to hardy perennials. “That would be dull,” he says. “I want other plant groups to extend the season of interest.” These range from his collection of tender aeoniums to the permanent structural contribution of copper beech, in the twin forms of a hedge and a specimen Fagus sylvatica ‘Dawyck Purple’ growing in pride of place at the end of the garden. 

“I’m a plantsman at heart. I want to grow a lot of different things, but I don’t want to be a slave to my garden, like I used to be. I once took a fortnight off work to get the old garden perfect for a National Garden Scheme opening. Now, I garden for pleasure, not for a deadline,” he says. “There’s enough here to keep me engaged all through the year, whether I’m actively gardening or enjoying the view from the sitting room sofa. The house and garden have a genuine relationship with each other, and both are a perfect reflection of me and how I want to live.”

The garden's modest dimensions are largely obscured at ground level thanks to clever organisation and carefully considered planting, and only revealed when looked down upon from an upstairs window