Horticultural consultant
A part-time head gardener for large gardens and small estates. Naomi visits every week, plans the planting and coordinates the team who look after it.
01273 381512
A head gardener for your garden, part time
Naomi Ferrett-Cohen is a horticultural consultant for large gardens and small estates. She takes on the role of a head gardener part time: visiting every week, designing the planting and planning the work for each season, and working with you and with the gardeners and suppliers who carry it out.
For you, that means one person who knows and manages the whole garden estate, holds the plan and keeps everyone working towards it, so the garden is looked after as one place, season after season.
Naomi has an RHS Level II in Horticulture and a Planting Design Diploma with Distinction, and planting is her passion.
When a part-time head gardener helps
An estate garden needs many gardeners to keep it thriving and well maintained. Naomi is used to managing gardeners and landscapers on her projects.
Many people work in the garden
Gardeners, landscapers and suppliers each do their part. Someone needs to hold the plan, set the priorities and make sure the work fits together.
The garden has grown beyond its plan
Borders mature, trees fill out and the way you use the garden changes. Naomi reviews the planting and refreshes it, so the garden keeps improving.
You want the garden to develop as one idea
A good team works best with a clear plan for what happens next. Naomi plans the work, so every season builds on the last.
What Naomi’s garden management includes
Weekly visits
Naomi visits the garden every week, so she sees it as it changes through the year and can act on what she sees.
Planting plans and fresh planting
Planting plans for new borders, and a fresh start for old ones. Naomi can take the plants out and begin again, or renew a border gradually over time, and she plants bulbs in generous drifts.
Seasonal work schedules
Naomi agrees a schedule of work with you for each season, so everyone knows what needs doing and when.
Plant sourcing
Naomi sources plants for the garden from specialist nurseries.
Your gardeners, landscapers and suppliers
Naomi meets and works with the people who work in your garden, and coordinates who does what. For regular jobs, such as mulching the borders, she brings in outside contractors. She works with your gardeners to create new areas, from kitchen gardens and wildflower meadows to more formal gardens by the house.
Help recruiting the right people
If you need a gardener or a supplier, Naomi helps you recruit them and brings them into the plan. When the garden needs several gardeners, she coordinates between them, so each part is looked after.
A schedule for every season
A large garden is looked after one season at a time. Naomi agrees a schedule of work with you for each one, so each job happens at the right time and by the right person. A schedule might cover pruning and cutting back, mulching and feeding, planting and dividing, sowing seeds, lawn and hedge work, and clearing and tidying.
Because Naomi visits every week, the schedule stays alive. She sees how the garden is doing, adjusts the plan to suit and makes sure the team has what it needs, from plants to decisions.
How Naomi’s garden management works
You tell Naomi about the garden
What you have, what you would like it to become, and who looks after it now.
Naomi visits and meets your team
She visits the garden and meets the gardeners, landscapers and suppliers who work in it.
You agree the plan and the schedule
Planting plans, a schedule of work for each season, and who does what.
Naomi visits every week
She coordinates the team, sources plants, helps recruit gardeners and suppliers where you need them, and refreshes the planting as the garden grows.
Trained in garden design and planting design
Naomi looks at a garden the way a designer does: as a whole, with the planting, the views and the way people use it all in mind. She trained at the London College of Garden Design, where she studied both garden design and planting design.
Her work includes two judged RHS Chelsea Flower Show gardens, in2018 and 2021, and two exhibition gardens for the Saatchi Gallery. For a garden you plan to enjoy for many years, that experience of planting for the long term is what she brings to the role.
Garden management in Sussex, Surrey and London
Naomi offers her garden consultancy to large gardens and small estates across Sussex, Surrey and London. She is based in Shoreham-by-Sea, and she plans her week around the gardens she looks after.
Garden designer in East and West Sussex →Garden designer in Surrey →Garden design services →
Questions about garden management
- What is a horticultural consultant?
- A horticultural consultant, sometimes called a garden consultant, horticulturist or horticulturalist, advises on plants and on how a garden is looked after. Naomi’s service goes further: she visits every week, plans the planting and the work, and meets, works with and helps recruit the people who carry it out.
- What is a part-time head gardener?
- A head gardener plans and runs the work in a large garden. Naomi takes on that role part time, sometimes described as a fractional or outsourced head gardener: weekly visits, planting plans, a schedule of seasonal work, plant sourcing, and coordination of your gardeners, landscapers and suppliers.
- Who is this for?
- Owners of large gardens and small estates, especially where several people work in the garden and it needs someone to hold the plan. Naomi works with you, and with whoever already looks after the garden.
- How often does Naomi visit?
- Every week. She sees the garden as it changes through the year, reviews the planting and the work in hand, and agrees what happens next with the people carrying it out.
- Can Naomi work with the gardeners and landscapers we already have?
- Yes. Naomi meets and works with your gardeners, landscapers and suppliers, helps recruit new people where you need them, and agrees a schedule of work with you for each season.
- Can Naomi take on an estate manager’s work?
- Naomi looks after the garden side of a large property: the planting, the programme of work and the people who carry it out, working alongside your estate manager.
- Where does Naomi work?
- Across Sussex, Surrey and London. She is based in Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex.
- How do we get started?
- Tell Naomi about the garden using the form below, or call her. She will arrange a time to talk and to see the garden.
Looking after a large garden?
Tell Naomi about the garden and who looks after it now. She reads every enquiry herself.
- RHS Chelsea Silver-Gilt
- London College of Garden Design