Cottage garden

A cottage garden is the deliberately abundant style: closely packed flowers, herbs, and often vegetables tumbling together with soft edges and very little bare soil. It grew out of practical English working gardens, where every inch did a job, and kept the charm long after it stopped being a necessity.

You read it by the density and the looseness. Plants are allowed to self-seed and lean on each other, paths are narrow, hard lines are blurred, and the palette is generous rather than restrained. Roses, foxglove, salvia, and hardy geraniums are the usual cast.

The thing people miss is that the wild look is edited. A cottage garden left fully alone becomes a weed patch in two seasons. It is one of the higher-touch styles to keep looking effortless — the relaxed effect takes regular thinning, deadheading, and decisions about what gets to stay.