 In September 1826 she promised her brother a plan of the recently acquired grant "when Papa has decided where our house is to be and the garden etc".Although Nurseryman Thomas Shepherd had practised as a landscape gardener many years previously in England and his 1835 (public) lecture (in Sydney) included suggestions for the further improvement of the Elizabeth Bay estate, he does not claim credit for involvement, however informal, in its design.It may be that Macleay considered his views old-fashioned.