Mien (Wilhemina) Ruys was born into a world of plants in 1904 as the daughter of two world-renowned plant growers. In fact she was literally born in a nursery, and not just any nursery but the world-famous Royal Moerheim Nurseries in the village of Dedemsvaart, 146kms from Amsterdam. By the time she was 20 she had started to experiment with plants in her own garden, watching them develop.

At this time, Dutch gardens were stiff and formal: simple parterres featuring a central fountain with box hedges and coloured gravel around neat flowerbeds. Private garden space was limited in post-war Holland as the population increased, yet even the most diminutive gardens were richly ornamented with statues and small pavilions in a quest for variety.

Ruys was probably influenced by plantsman Karl Foerster, a colleague of her father, who was part of the ‘modern’ movement towards more naturalistic gardens featuring herbaceous perennials. Undoubtedly she was also influenced by Gertrude Jekyll’s English style of colour-planned flower borders.

By the 1950 Ruys had become well-known as a designer whose emphasis was on bold, simple forms, and who was keen to shake things up and work out how gardens could be done differently. She experimented with materials to make her gardens more interesting, using timber decking, concrete and railway sleepers within naturalistic plantings. These materials were new and gave her gardens a strong design which she softened with ‘wild’ planting. This new garden style had a profound influence on other garden designers of her generation, setting off a direction that can be seen in many contemporary Dutch designers.

Around the same time in England the leading taste-makers were Vita Sackville-West at Sissinghurst and Lawrence Johnson at Hidcote. Both these influential gardens were designed by their owners as a series of ‘rooms’, each with a different theme. Meanwhile, in California, Thomas Church was developing his California Style using asymmetrical designs, raised planting beds, sitting walls and timber decks and in Australia, Edna Walling was designing relaxed, free-flowing spaces, with simple stone walls and an emphasis on Australian plants.

Ruys’s own garden in Dedemsvaart is hidden from the road by high hedges.  It comprises 28 different gardens, reflecting her changing attitudes to garden design over a period of 70 years. I arrived on a clear bright day early in June and as I wandered I was surprised by the absence of crowds, not at all like the throngs at famous English gardens.

The garden isn’t static, with old gardens being renovated and new areas developed. The most recent garden is the Roof Terrace, created just last year, which features the use of a new sustainable timber product, called Plato wood, in screens, reclining seats and raised vegetable gardens. I was also taken with the display of contemporary sculpture pieces set in the wild grass meadow garden.

Perhaps my favourite of all though, was the Sunken Garden, which dates from 1960, and in which Ruys used railway sleepers for the first time. This gave her the opportunity for designs with differences in heights. This Sunken Garden has an intimate enclosed effect, which I found was best appreciated from a seat under a beautiful dogwood (Cornus kousa) with  a line of view  between the two sun borders to a dark copper beech hedge.

Even now, 12 years after her death, partly due to her refreshing approach and her design philosophy, the garden is brimming with ideas for the garden lover. Meticulous maintenance by Ruys’ design office and the ongoing renovation of the different gardens keeps this garden in the spirit of its founder. The Ruys design philosophy remains alive.