Annabel Hughes meets garden designer Stella Caws.

Garden designer Stella Caws says her job is 'all about creating pictures'. "To me a garden is a series of pictures framed by the windows of the house."

Stella trained as a landscape architect at Sheffield University. After a career break to raise her children, James and Lizzie, she launched her garden design business, Stella Caws Associates, from the family's home in Bridge Street, Chepstow in 1990.

Now based at Sedbury, Stella's design skills are in constant demand and clients have the added 'design-and-build' option through her husband Bob's company GardenScapes. "I started by designing gardens for friends and the business just grew by recommendation," Stella explained. "A major boost was winning the gold award for the garden I did for South Wales Potters at the Ebbw Vale Garden Festival. It led to numerous private commissions." Another themed garden for South Wales Potters at Hampton Court Palace Flower Show led to a commission from Citroen Cars to create a garden for BBC Gardeners' World Live.

The company wanted 'something modern with clean lines that reflected their image'. Her design featured water, steel, decking and glass with a striking mirrored obelisk as the focal point. "The challenge was finding somewhere to put the show car!"

Show gardens have to be built at lightning speed and look immaculate. "I enjoy doing them because you can let your imagination run wild and it's very exciting. There's a great feeling of camaraderie, with everyone helping each other, because you're really only competing against yourself. The number of awards reflect the standards reached. The judges might decide to give out five golds, or none at all."

The 'real' gardens Stella designs are unique to each client. The starting point is always a ground survey. She and the client then discuss what purpose the garden has to fulfil and Stella works up a design tailored to those needs. "The challenge is interpreting the client's wishes in an artistic way. "I might, for example, come up with something for a young family that will 'grow' with the children or something that's simple, low maintenance and practically dog-proof! "One lovely request was from a client who wanted to theme her garden around the Holy Land. I created a pathway in the shape of the Christian fish symbol and planted it with herbs indigenous to that part of the world. "The most common request is for something that's easy to maintain because people today lead such busy lives. "Television gardening programmes have really stimulated the interest in design. My clients have become far more adventurous. They're keen on things like sculptures and water features whereas, when I started, it was all patios and borders. "The other big change is that gardens are treated as an outside living space. With gas barbecues, patio heating and outdoor lighting it's possible to enjoy them all-year-round. "And people are increasingly interested in growing their own vegetables, picking their own herbs..."

Stella's biggest project to date was the masterplan for the national centre for organic gardening run by the Henry Doubleday Research Association in Yalding, Kent 10 years ago.

The aim for the three-acre greenfield site was to develop a show garden illustrating organic gardening through the ages.

Stella was responsible for designing the basic layout and main features including a huge pergola, wildlife lake, woodland area and numerous circular borders. Within the scheme the Association then planted 10 demonstration gardens.

Her impressive design led to a commission from a member of the Aga Khan's family to revamp the borders of a chateau at Lake Geneva!

For Stella no job is too big or too small.

She derives just as much pleasure from creating a tiny, traditional cottage garden for a terraced town-house. "Personally I like gardens with a modern framework but with traditional English planting - roses, irises, shrubs, herbaceous plants. "And I love water features. I don't think a garden's complete without one." While Stella concentrates on design, husband Bob is expanding his company GardenScapes. "I was looking for a career change and it seemed the obvious thing to build on Stella's skills and knowledge," he said. "We looked at various options and the opportunity came up to start a landscape products supply business. At the same time we pulled together a specialist team (including a stone mason, carpenter and plantsman) to build Stella's and other people's designs. "Nowadays we do the building for two thirds of Stella's clients. We also have two retail outlets - one in Chepstow, one in Gloucestershire. "The emphasis is on quality, on 'creative designs built by craftsmen'. Lots of people will design and build a garden cheaper than we do, but you won't get better value for money."

Appropriately enough Stella and Bob's cottage at Sedbury Park was once the bothy for the estate's garden workers. It's adjoined by the Victorian walled kitchen garden which they've painstakingly restored. "The garden had been derelict for about 15 years. It was a wonderful project to take on," said Stella. "When I saw all the brambles and bits of the original Victorian greenhouse sticking out of the ground I was in seventh heaven!"

It took several years to get rid of the brambles. But the kitchen garden now provides the family with dozens of varieties of vegetables and fruit - from globe artichokes to sea kale, from apricots and figs to kiwi fruit and peaches. "The soil is beautiful because it was fertilised over the years by seaweed from the foreshore. "In its heyday Sedbury Park Estate would have had about 30 gardeners. The boys who lived in the bothy would have got up in the night to stoke the boiler which heated the greenhouses! "We restored everything that was saveable like the 100-year-old vinery and the cucumber house. The orchard has 30 different varieties of apple and pear trees. "We now have fresh fruit from July to March. The Victorians knew how to plant for that effect."

Stella is currently designing a garden entitled Welsh Gold for the Royal Horticultural Society Spring Flower Show in Cardiff, featuring the mineral wealth of Wales, coal, slate and gold. "It's based around the history of Wales but in the form of a modern urban courtyard."

Her lifelong ambition, she says, is to create a garden for the Chelsea Flower Show. For more information visit www.stellacaws.com