When you think of the typical English garden, you may imagine meandering paths through bright, beautiful flowerbeds, featuring sweet-smelling roses, peonies and lavender, tall blooms of foxgloves and delphiniums; and hydrangeas shrubs dotted with big round flower heads. 

The timeless appeal of the English garden is often traced back to the 17th century when landscape architect William Kent eschewed the usual formal-styled garden for a softer, more naturalistic look that incorporated water elements such as ponds and lakes, sloping lawns and paths, tree groves and classical focal points like temples, columns and arches.

Lancelot “Capability” Brown enhanced Kent’s aesthetic by designing more than 250 English and Welsh estates in the mid-18th century, seeking to incorporate comfort, economy and elegance in all of his work. He favored the majestic cedars of Lebanon and often used the evergreen in his designs. Serpentine lakes, sweeping drives — often accessed by classic or Gothic-styled bridges — and decorative buildings were hallmarks of his style.

Humphry Repton appropriated some of Brown's legacy and added more formal, structured features like terraces to his own designs. Repton sought to create easy transitions between inside and outdoor spaces and liked using steps and balustrades to move from casual to formal areas of an estate.

The English Garden continued changing through the Victorian Era when more ornate designs were favored, and the Arts and Crafts Movement in the late 19th and early 20th century — as gardens blended traditional and native plants and embraced the importance of function as well as visual charm. 

Today’s English Garden pays attention to sustainability and biodiversity, with less manicured lawns and an emphasis on native planting that provides habitats like pollinators with food. Smaller gardens appropriate for more urban settings scale back typical features, replacing gazebos with pergolas. Busy lifestyles impact the types of plants chosen, as easy-to-care for shrub roses are selected over the Hybrid Tea Rose (which needs regular pruning, pest control treatment and daily watering). 

For those who desire to bring the English garden look indoors, Thibaut’s Anna French offers many wallcovering designs that embrace this lovely vision, including:

Belvedere

Belvedere offers much charm, and is full of romantic images of flowers, tree and clouds made even prettier with pearl and embroidered details. The collection tells the quaint story of small-town life and its natural beauty with murals and wallcovering. Holly Trellis is especially captivating — and takes its inspiration from holly flowers.

Bristol

The Bristol Collection showcases the beauty of lush, leafy foliage. Bring the essence of the English countryside inside, with vines of ferns, flowers bursting into bloom and roaming butterflies. You’ll find a verdant color palette, full of earth tones, soft pinks and blue hues, and stormy blacks and greys. We especially recommend Lindsey, a small blocklike print available in several colorways, and the Whitcombe Park Mural, made from an etching of Johannes Kip, a Dutch engraver and craftsman, in which a three-panel set brings the beautiful Whitcombe Park estate and its sprawling grassy hills, cottages and horse-drawn carriages into your world.

Devon

The Devon Collection infuses your home with the best of spring with its emphasis on English florals. You’ll find its color palette, featuring warm caramel tones, soft rose and gold.  Fabrics and Home loves the Savery Mural with its thin trees and images of pastoral farming and Dahlia — a multi-colored pattern inspired by a 1920s English document of a Dahlia flower.

Shop for Anna French Wallcoverings at Fabrics and Home.

Learn more about the designer's legacy in our in-depth profile of her son, Jonathan French.

Featured photo: Bristol Whitcombe Park Mural in sky blue/green