Browse all Courses
Browse all courses / Perennial Meadow Gardening
Learn with Michael King

Perennial Meadow Gardening

Learn how to create perennial meadow planting schemes by taking the Perennial Meadow Gardening course on Learning with Experts.

Course overview

In this lesson we will define the perennial meadow and it's place it within the history of the use of perennials in gardens over the last hundred years. Naturalistic planting will be explained and contrasted with the alternatives available to contemporary gardeners and designers. The New Perennial Movement and the manner in which perennial meadows can bring the same aims within the confines of a domestic garden will be illuminated.

Meet Michael King

Michael King is a Senior at Kew Gardens botanist, designer and author. For the past twenty years Michael has lived in the Netherlands where he, writes, designs and gardens. Flowering perennials, ornamental grasses and tulips are now Michael’s specialities having written many books on these subjects as well as numerous gardening articles on subjects as diverse as annual flowers, garden design and the life and work of other professional garden designers for many international garden magazines. His first two books, written jointly with Piet Oudolf, revealed how to use ornamental grasses and other perennials in naturalistic gardens, a popular trend in Continental Europe. For more information about Michael see his web blog at www.perennialmeadows.com

Course description

Perennial and grasses expert Michael King teaches you how to grow and design a perennial meadow garden.

Michael wrote The Perennial Garden book and co-wrote Gardening with Grasses with garden designer Piet Oudolf.

Perennial meadows can be adapted to any scale from a single garden border, to the replacement of lawns and can be used in wide parkland landscapes. Perennial meadows are inspired by open countryside, fields, meadows and prairies. Michael will also cover the New Perennial Planting design movement, which brings naturalistic planting within the scope of the private garden.

You'll learn Michael's perennial meadow planting design system, which combines planting to fit a range of different settings, and includes bold planting mixtures combining key theme plants with complementary plants. You'll also learn about the ideas underpinning naturalistic plant associations.

Michael will explain the characteristics of effective plants and the role played by complimentary plants to be able to start creating perennial meadow planting schemes of your own. As you learn you'll be selecting plants, planning site design and calculating how many plants are needed, and how to planting and maintaining new schemes.

You'll learn:

  • how to define and use a perennial meadow garden design
  • which plants to include in your designs as theme plants and complementary plants
  • designing your landscape for seasonal interest
  • creating structural garden designs

Absolutely fantastic! With just four sessions i learned so much! Expert comments were helpful and personalized. I especially appreciate learning about new plants and of course the cutting-edge way to design a bed of perennials! - LT

The course includes:

  • 4 on-demand video lessons - presented by Michael King
  • lifetime access to the videos, notes and interactive class
  • flexible classes - join and learn when and where you like
  • downloadable lesson notes
  • practical perennial meadow design projects (with tutor feedback available)
  • access on your mobile, PC, Mac or laptop
  • small interactive online classroom - chat online to students from around the world and share your creative ideas

    Time to complete the perennial meadow garden design course:

Every student is different but in general we think the whole course will take around 13 hours 55 minutes to complete including:

  • Video lessons: 1 hours 55 minutes in total
  • Course notes: 30 minutes per lesson
  • Your planting design projects: at least 2 hours per lesson
  • Interactive classroom time: 15 minutes per lesson
  • Tutor feedback review (Expert level): 15 minutes per lesson


    You'll need:

You don't need ay special equipment, but you will be making lists of plants and sketches of garden designs. This course is suitable for all levels of gardeners from beginners to professional gardeners who want to learn more about the specialist horticulture and garden design skills to create a perennial meadow.