Gardens: Urban idyll - in pictures

Only 200 yards away is a busy London high street: clogged with traffic, thronging with people. But sitting in Edwina Roberts' garden in Muswell Hill, you'd think you were in Ambridge. The only sound is of bees and birdsong, and the air is thick with the fragrance of honeysuckle. There's a feeling of tranquility and seclusion. Though the plot is tiny – 55ft long and a little over 40ft across at its widest point – it feels enormous. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

'By midsummer you can’t see the fences at all,' says Edwina Roberts. 'They’re clothed in climbers, chosen for fragrance and foliage as well as flower. Most are not evergreen, but blocks of bamboo and photinia break up the boundary line in winter.
It’s astonishing how many changes of mood a clever gardener can fit into a limited space. Formal terraces for an evening gin and tonic; secret arbours to hide away with a book; shady woodland; soothing water; colourful prairie – all are somehow shoe-horned in between the back fence and the kitchen door. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

'It seems so pretentious to talk of creating a sense of discovery in such a small area, but that’s what I was trying to do,' says Edwina Roberts. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

'I worked on the same principle as creating a room: if you have lots of little bits of furniture, you make it look smaller. You’re better off with a couple of big sofas and a single coffee table. So make features such as ponds as big as you can, and borders as deep as you can: deep borders are kinder, because they give you room to make mistakes.' Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

'Limiting the different types of plant creates a rhythm in the garden, and pulls it all together. When a plant works well in my horrible stiff clay I stick with it – so you’ll see thalictrums, Geranium ‘Ann Folkard’, aconitum and Japanese anemones all over the garden, in ribbons of planting that fade out, then pop up again elsewhere.' Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

Against the back fence are two large mirrors, the size and shape of doorways. 'By making pathways towards them, and blurring the edges with planting, you can deceive the eye into thinking the garden continues,' says Roberts. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

'Big plants help your eye to travel round the garden. I use evergreen Choisya ternata and Fatsia japonica, which also give the garden some structure in winter.'
Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

The sense of tranquility is extraordinary for a suburban London garden. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus

Each part of the garden is devoted to a different season: the woodlandy bit is very much a spring garden, while the sunniest part is best in summer. By August the box lollies, so prominent in winter, are submerged in a mass of eupatorium and persicaria. Photograph: MMGI/Marianne Majerus