Bringing You Back to Nature
Bringing You Back to Nature
An Interview with Alexander Warren-Gash, Co-founder and Garden Designer at Mashamba Design
You started Mashamba when you moved to Mallorca nearly 20 years ago. What drew you to garden design?
I suppose you could say I’ve always been a bit of an explorer. I’m drawn to jungles, volcanoes, deserts, canyons — the vast and untamed landscapes most people don’t reach. Treks through the Algerian mountains, remote parts of Africa, living in the wild of Costa Rica... these are the experiences that fuel me.
Garden design allows me to bring that feeling into everyday life - it’s the best office I can imagine. I love the challenge of blending my creativity with the natural world — understanding a landscape and shaping it into something that works beautifully.
I also want to help people spend more time outdoors — to create a space that’s entirely their own, where they can disconnect and enjoy the quiet of nature. That to me is the ultimate luxury.
Spending time in nature is central to your design philosophy. Did your passion for the outdoors begin in Costa Rica or does it go back even further?
You're absolutely right — Costa Rica is certainly synonymous with nature, but my passion for the outdoors actually began much earlier, during my childhood in Africa. My father — perhaps one of the last great British eccentrics — was a highly respected ambassador there, but outside the office he spent his days traipsing through the jungle with a butterfly net.
His passion for discovering new species took him to many exotic places and he often brought me along. I joined my first expedition to Cameroon when I was just twelve. And while my father was singularly focused on butterflies, I couldn't help but notice and appreciate the extraordinary beauty of all the nature surrounding us — including the lions, elephants and buffalo!
Bringing it back to Mallorca — what are the five essential plants for a Mediterranean garden?
Most of our designs feature an old and gnarled Olea europaea (olive) as a focal point. We also like to include Salvia rosmarinus (trailing rosemary), Agave attenuata (foxtail agave) and Oenothera lindheimeri (gaura) for their structure, scent and seasonal interest.
And to me, no Mediterranean garden is complete without citrus — we like to include at least one Citrus limon (lemon tree) in every project. It brings evergreen beauty and a sense of abundance to the garden.
What plants are in your own garden?
We wanted a garden that was easy to care for and required little water. It’s mostly planted with native evergreen species like olive, citrus, rosemary and Pistacia lentiscus (mastic).
For seasonal interest, we’ve added Trachelospermum jasminoides (star jasmine) for scent and white gaura for their light, airy blooms and long flowering season.
How much of your garden design is led by the client and how much is shaped by Mashamba’s own style?
Most of our clients choose us because they’re drawn to our style, but every garden we create is an interpretation of the client’s dream. We consider the seasons they’ll be in the garden, their favourite plants and colours, how they plan to use the space and what features they’d like to include — whether it’s an outdoor kitchen, a pétanque court, a water fountain or even a large sculpture.
But no matter the style or elements, there’s always something unmistakably Mashamba about our gardens.
What makes a garden feel unmistakably Mashamba then?
It’s that sense of relaxed elegance — we design gardens to feel natural and effortless, even though every detail is intentional.
Take our aromatic meadows. They may look untamed, but they’re carefully designed with layers of ornamental grasses like Stipa tenuissima (Mexican feather grass) and Cenchrus alopecuroides (Chinese fountain grass), mixed with perennial flowers such as gaura and Salvia yangii (perovskia), to create wild compositions full of colour, texture, scent and movement.
Is there anything else that defines a Mashamba garden?
I’d have to say our cloud gardens. Traditionally, a cloud garden is formed from a single plant species shaped into rounded, organic forms to resemble a bank of clouds. The Mashamba version is more textured, layered and relaxed. We use a mix of species to create soft, sculptural groupings in varying tones and leaf forms that are punctuated by perennial blooms.
We typically work with native, drought-tolerant shrubs like rosemary, mastic and Teucrium fruticans (germander). With careful pruning, they form a full cloud garden in about a year. It takes patience, but the result is an evergreen structure that brings beauty and interest all year round.
Your gardens are so abundant and lush. What’s your secret?
The secret to a Mashamba garden is soil preparation and appropriate watering. With those two things — and assuming the plant selection suits the climate — your garden is likely to thrive.
I tell clients that the difference between planting in quality topsoil versus existing soil is enormous. And I always recommend investing in soil preparation over buying larger plants. A smaller plant in good soil will quickly outgrow a larger plant in poor soil.
What is the garden design you have done in the last few years that you liked the most?
I do have a favourite garden, but it would be unprofessional of me to say which one! What I can say is that my favourite gardens inspire you to get outside to explore, enjoy, disconnect and be present. What gets you outside can be something as simple as a bench placed to take in the view. Or it can be something more magical, like a dining table set in the dappled light of an old carob tree.
I also love gardens that engage the senses — the rustle of swaying grasses, the perfume of jasmine, the brush of a soft-leafed plant and the simple pleasure of picking and eating an orange. Sensory gardens are simply more enjoyable — they draw you in, inviting you to touch, smell, taste, wander and stay a while.
