A perfectly formed small city garden by our Garden Designer of the Year | House & Garden

Pale brick pavers, laid in a herringbone pattern, run from the open-plan ground floor out into the garden, creating a seamless transition between the two spaces.

There is a particular style of elevated simplicity that is anything but simple. You will find it in the cut of a cashmere sweater from Loro Piana, in the glaze of Edmund de Waal’s porcelain pots and in the gardens designed by Luciano Giubbilei, our Garden Designer of the year for 2024. Although born in Siena, Luciano has been based in London for 30 years and these days mainly works on large-scale projects in rural settings. But he retains an Italianate emphasis on proportion and balance that is especially evident within the confines of his smaller city garden designs.

Three years ago, Luciano created this tiny green jewel of a garden in west London that perfectly illustrates his skills. ‘It was a simple space adjoining a communal garden,’ he explains. ‘But it required harmony in every element – the height of the tree canopy, the placing of the sculpture, the tapestry of foliage and the relationship between the garden and the interior of the house.’

Barbara Hepworth's sculpture ‘Youth’, from her series ‘The Family of Man’ is at the heart of the planting.

The project was a collaboration with interior designer Steven Volpe, whose San Francisco studio is known for producing quietly sleek, sensuous schemes and who, like Luciano, has a reputation for furnishing spaces with art. A sculpture by Barbara Hepworth entitled Youth (from her The Family of Man series) provides a distinctive anchor at the heart of the planting in this garden, as well as an eye-catcher from inside the house.

‘We thought as carefully about how that vignette is framed when you are looking at it from