What Is A Formal Garden?

Think clipped box hedges surrounding carefully stocked borders with neat planting. A formal garden could be described as a very neat garden. The hard landscaping such as paths and terraces will be of regular shape and self-sown plants will largely be eradicated in favour of carefully designed colour schemes. The clipped topiary of stately homes and rose gardens of old fashioned municipal parks both come under the heading "formal". In contrast the rampant self-seeded beauty of the cottage garden where vegetables share space with flowers and shrubs and paths wind and spill gravel onto irregular shaped beds might be thought the opposite of the formal garden. In reality both styles overlap and co-exist.