Robert Myers is fastidious in his attention to detail and produces sharp, elegant architectural forms and spaces using innovative design ideas and materials. Robert’s designs explore the relationship between the architectural and natural world.
For him the hard landscape is not purely a functional element; the hard and soft landscape elements should work together to, and must relate in terms of their form, colour and texture.
In the Brewin Dolphin Garden rounded pebble seats mirror domed forms within the planting, while a cantilevered timber canopy echoes the form of an enclosing pleached hedge. His bold structures and subtly sculptural forms often play with light and shade, with the choice of materials establishing a colour palette and mood for the space. Water is a unifying element, both moving and still, linking spaces and bringing sound and reflected light into the garden.
The striking cantilevered structure is designed to shelter and add form, and act as a framing device and canopy for the table and chairs beneath it. The way that the pleached Acer Campestre trees wrap around the back and side walls opposite creates a similar strong presence and feeling of security. The steel & timber cantilevered slats are sloped in a way that show their texture, a notch is cut out of each one, giving a sculptural organ-pipe appearance.
A 1960s sensibility is given to the garden courtesy of the unique two metre high walls that encompass an interesting repeat leaf print motif. The walls are made from marine plywood with the leaf design scooped out to create contouring through the layers of ply, thus adding texture and interest.
Robert commissioned Cornish sculptor Ben Barrell to design a sculpture for the garden that would complement the geometry of the garden. Barrell enjoyed the challenge of combining geometric and spherical shapes and designed a 1.65 metre high sculpture of polished cast concrete and bronze resin to sit in front of the wall. Inspiration for the sculpture included Brewin Dolphin’s core values of nurturing and taking excellent care of their clients. Barrell is also the designer of the polished concrete pebble seats located towards the front of the garden. The pebbles are in four distinct colours, cream, white and shades of grey and look and feel just like natural stones.
The pathway is of mixed materials, creamy York stone forms the terrace at the front of the garden and to the right of the terrace and pebble seating is a fine grained Iroko wood path, just over a metre wide and made up of 40mm slats with colour variations from the natural yellowish tone darkening to a rich brown. The timber path runs all the way through the garden and forms an L shape which crosses over the waterway.
The journey of water in the garden begins with a pebble water wall towards the rear, set into an aubergine coloured rendered wall. This flows into a canal that runs along the side of the garden into a broad pool at the front. The section of water closest to the canopy is still and calm and contains aquatic plants around the base of the sculpture.
Under the pavilion canopy sits a chic white steel table and four matching chairs designed by estudi{H}ac, each of the pieces has a cut out daisy like floral pattern. To the rear of the garden three lounge chairs and a low level coffee table from Richard Schultz’s 1966 collection for Knoll complete this tranquil space.
The garden is crisp, modernist and based on L- shaped forms. Understated and elegant the overall feel of the garden will be that of an urban setting with both hard and soft elements working together to create structure and a sense of security in a relaxing, convivial space.