Not sure where to start with your garden?

 

 

Not sure where to start with your garden?

If you’ve ever stood at the back door looking at your garden and thought, “I don’t know anything about gardens. I haven’t got a clue where to start,” you’re certainly not alone. It’s one of the first things people say when they contact me. They don’t usually ask which plants they should buy or whether a contemporary or cottage garden would suit them best. They simply know the garden isn’t working for them, but they don’t know what to do first.

That’s hardly surprising. A garden can feel like one enormous project, with patios, fences, lawns, planting, seating, storage, lighting and dozens of decisions all competing for attention. The temptation is to pick one job, get started and hope everything else falls into place later. Unfortunately, that’s also how expensive mistakes happen.

For me, the important first step isn’t choosing plants or paving. It’s working out how you actually want to live in the garden.

Think about your life before your plants

One of the biggest surprises for new clients is that I don’t begin by asking which plants they like. I want to know whether they dream of breakfast outside in the morning sunshine, friends gathering around a table on summer evenings, somewhere peaceful to read, space for grandchildren to play or simply a lovely view from the kitchen window. Someone who adores gardening needs a very different space from someone who wants the garden to be beautiful but would rather spend Saturday afternoon enjoying it than maintaining it.

Once I understand those things, the design becomes much easier to unravel. We can decide where people should sit, where they’ll naturally walk, what needs screening, what should stay and which areas deserve the most attention. The principle is simple: a successful garden begins with the people who will use it, not with a shopping list of plants.

I’ve always believed that a good garden can double your living space — make it work for you. It shouldn’t only be something attractive to look at through the window. If it’s planned properly, it can become somewhere you genuinely choose to spend time.

Follow the sun, not convention

One of the most expensive mistakes I see is also one of the simplest. People put the patio immediately outside the back door because that’s where patios traditionally go, then discover that the sun disappears from it at two o’clock and nobody wants to sit there on a summer evening.

Before making a permanent decision, I want to understand where the sun falls at different times of day and, importantly, how that changes through the year. Perhaps the area near the house is perfect for breakfast but the far end of the garden catches the evening sun. In that case, I’d rather design around the way you’ll actually use the space than follow convention simply because every neighbouring garden has its seating in the same place.

This is exactly the sort of issue that’s easy to miss when you’ve lived with a garden for years. You may already accept that the chairs get dragged down the lawn every sunny evening without ever asking whether the seating area itself is in the wrong place. Part of my role is to spot those practical things before money is spent on paving, pergolas or landscaping that are difficult and expensive to move later.

Plan for what you might want in five years, not just this summer

Another common problem is adding one feature at a time without any long-term plan. The shed goes into the sunniest corner because that space happens to be empty. A patio is added somewhere else. Then, three years later, you decide you’d love a hot tub, outdoor kitchen or pergola and realise the perfect position has already been used.

You don’t have to be able to afford your dream garden today to make room for it. If you think you might want a jacuzzi in five years, we can allow for it now. If an outdoor dining space is part of the long-term dream, it’s much better to identify the right location before permanent structures are added elsewhere.

Good garden planning isn’t about filling every available space immediately; it’s about making sure today’s decisions don’t prevent tomorrow’s possibilities.

That is one of the reasons I create garden project plans. I can help you look at the whole garden first, decide what belongs where and then break the work into realistic stages. The overall plan and the order in which things happen are often far more important at this point than choosing individual plants.

Seeing the finished garden before you begin

Gardens can be particularly difficult to imagine because the finished result may be months or even years away. That’s why I include a Garden Inspiration Image in my plans. It brings the layout, structure and overall feel together visually, so you can picture the garden you’re creating before committing to landscaping, materials or planting.

You don’t need to know everything about gardening before you begin. What matters is knowing what you want from your garden and making the big decisions with that in mind.

A small Bristol garden with a big plan

A garden project in Bristol sums this up beautifully. The family had a neglected side garden and a wish list that included a pergola, a grown-up seating area, scented planting, an easy-to-maintain garden, a small lawn and the rather specific challenge of keeping the trampoline “out of sight but in sight too”.

Instead of treating each request separately, I brought everything together into one overall plan and created an Inspiration Image so they could see how the finished garden could work. They’re now tackling the project in stages, using local gardeners to work from that clear design rather than asking several companies to come up with completely different solutions.

They told me the plan had managed to incorporate what both of them wanted, and the quotations from local gardeners were considerably lower than the design-and-landscaping quotes they had received before. For me, that’s exactly what a good garden plan should do: give you a clear destination, while still allowing you to create it at a pace and budget that work for you.

 

Not sure where to start with your own garden?

I can help you look at the whole space, work out how you want to use it and create a practical plan and Inspiration Image to show you where you’re heading. I work mainly remotely from your photographs, videos, measurements and a conversation, so your garden can be planned wherever you live.

See my garden design services here