Traditional English cottage gardens were rarely designed as works of art, but they were often more unified than many highly designed gardens. This is because the design of the traditional cottage garden was dictated by utility. Many people have an image of cottage gardens as romantic flower gardens with winding paths, real cottage gardens were much more practical. Most cottage gardens were created by agricultural workers who were accustomed to growing crops in straight rows, this is how they planted their gardens. There was a very strong connection between cottage gardens and traditional agricultural methods.
There was usually a straight path leading from the garden's gate to the door of the cottage. On either side of the path there were flower borders, narrow enough to easily weed. These borders were an unsophisticated mix of flowers, there was rarely any attempt to limit the color combinations. The flowers were grown to make the garden pretty, but they were also cut to provide flowers for the local church, and to put on graves.
The rest of the garden was mainly used to grow food and herbs. Until the 19th century, herbs were the main way to treat illness. Before the Reformation, most cottagers would not have grown a lot of herbs, since there was usually a nearby monastery with a large collection of herbs. After the dissolution of the monasteries, each cottager had to be more self-sufficient.
The need to grow vegetables kept these gardens from being a riot of color. The borders along the main path were full of flowers, but you should picture most of the garden in shades of green. The vegetables and herbs were usually grown in straight rows or narrow geometric beds. The last thing that agricultural workers wanted were gardens that were difficult to weed. The narrow beds and rows of plants gave the gardens a simple geometric structure which unified the hodge-podge collection of plants.
Cottage gardens which lack this structure need more artistry to tie all of the plants together. If the structure doesn't unify the garden, it is often necessary to be sophisticated about color and texture. If you want a cottage garden, it is best to let utility dictate the design. Cottage gardens which include fountains and rock gardens are rarely as successful as less pretentious cottage gardens.
Gardens which are unified by utility are unified by their singleness of purpose. The garden has to obviously exist for one primary reason. A large garden with an area for growing vegetables, a rose garden, a water garden and a rock garden will need to be unified by art. The more that your garden attempts to be, the more sophisticated you need to be about design.
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