30 
House & Garden 
HOW SMALL MAY A GARDEN BE? 
Some Suggestions for Small Plots and Slender Purses Which Will 
Help Them Achieve Real Garden Charm 
RICHARD H. PRATT, 2nd 
I T is becoming more and 
more a matter of concern, 
this necessity for fitting the gar¬ 
den within constantly contracting 
limits of both space and expense. 
On the one hand it is the outcome 
of a considerable growth of the 
garden urge among those of us 
whose not unslender means pro¬ 
hibit any sort of extensive devel¬ 
opment, and on the other hand it 
is the result of the ever diminish¬ 
ing size of building plots among 
the newer suburban communities. 
For one reason or the other a 
garden seems often a dubious pos¬ 
sibility. At least it is often won¬ 
dered just how small a garden 
may be and still be a garden. It 
is, then, to arrive at some solution 
for such a situation and, perhaps, 
to reassure and encourage those 
who find themselves in a similar 
quandary that these few princi¬ 
ples of small garden planning are 
set forth and these various ab¬ 
stract examples of diminutive gar¬ 
dens are shown. 
The Detached Garden 
Let us consider first a garden 
that is altogether independent of 
the house. Here it will not be 
necessary to look to comparative 
sizes of house and garden in order 
to ward off incongruities of scale 
and we can reduce the dimen¬ 
sions to extremes of smallness. 
Diagram A shows a perfectly 
square garden simply designed. 
A foot and a half has been al¬ 
lowed for an enclosure which is 
no more than enough if it is to be 
a hedge. The beds have been 
given a width of four feet so that 
plant groupings may still be ar¬ 
ranged effectively. To reduce this 
dimension would be to make any 
perennial planting thin and 
wholly unsubstantial. The width 
of the paved path is three feet 
and on it two persons may walk 
together or pass. If it were 
smaller it would not only be un¬ 
comfortable but it would become 
out of scale with the rest of the 
garden. A pool may seem a tre¬ 
mendous waste of space in such a 
tiny garden, but the mere fact that 
it is an unusually small garden 
makes it all the more necessary 
that as much interest as possible 
be provided. The central space 
All the elements of a real garden are included in this little plan 
which is but 20' square. Even the sense of seclusion is created 
by the surrounding hedge of clipped arborvitae 
An effective garden on a hillside may be created in small space if a 
path is laid between a planted retaining wall on one side and a 
perennial border on the other 
Here is a garden planned to be in very close contact with a large 
house and yet remain small itself. The paths are the width of the 
door openings of the house, and the axes converge 
of the garden is large enough to 
give a decent perspective of the * 
whole garden from the seat op¬ 
posite the entrance path. Thus 
we have a garden measuring 
twenty feet in each direction that 
is complete in itself, and full of 
decorative possibilities with the 
planting, the paving and the 
water. 
There are situations detached 
from the influence of the house 
that will require different treat¬ 
ment, a different shape and dif¬ 
ferent materials according to the 
nature of the site; but all alike 
they will require the quality that 
will claim and hold the interest. 
This quality will be lost if, in 
trying to cut down the size to a 
minimum, valuable features are 
eliminated and beds and paths 
are reduced to insignificant pro¬ 
portions. A garden on a hillside 
may occupy very little space by 
running a path between a planted 
retaining wall on one side and a 
perennial border on the other. A 
seat at one end and a sun dial, 
a bird bath or a figure at the other 
will give it an air of complete¬ 
ness. A garden of this character 
need only be thirteen feet wide if 
we allow a foot and a half for the 
wall on the uphill side, four feet 
for a turf path, six feet for a 
flower border and another foot 
and a half for some sort of back¬ 
ground for the planting on the 
lower side. Its length should not 
be less than thirty feet. Rock 
gardens and wild gardens can¬ 
not concern us in our attempt to 
find a limit of smallness, as their 
very definite informality allows 
them*to merge into their surround¬ 
ings with such ease that they may 
occupy a few square yards with¬ 
out giving to any great degree a 
feeling of compression. 
Gardens Near the House 
It is less simple to deal with 
gardens that are attached to the 
house. Here there are other ele¬ 
ments to control the size of the 
layout in addition to the practical 
requirements of beds and paths. 
There is a comparative relation¬ 
ship in size between the house 
and the garden that, as a rule, 
must be maintained. It is called 
scale. If the garden is out of 
