First Steps To Planning Your New Garden
Just starting the garden makeover process? Here are some important first steps to planning your new garden.
Nowadays our gardens are an important part of our lives. They provide places for entertaining outdoors, for children to play, and for de-stressing and working on our wellbeing. If your garden doesn’t live up to your expectations, it’s time to give it a makeover. Here’s how to get started.
- List all of the things you love about your garden.
- Now list the things you’re not so keen on - the things that keep you indoors and stop you from using your garden.
- Think of all the ways you would use your garden if you possibly could.
4. Visit public gardens to get a feel for the style you might like.
5. Set a budget for your garden makeover.
6. Contact an APL garden designer to help you design and craft the garden of your dreams.
What Do You Love About Your Garden?
No garden is all bad - in fact most people will agree that there’s no substitute for having speedy and FREE access to outdoor space. Somewhere that you can feel the sun on your face, breathe in the fresh air and just ‘be’.
No matter how awful you think your garden is right now, It’s a good thing to start the process of planning your new garden its potential. When you can see a glimmer of hope, you’re more likely to be determined to make more of your outdoor space.
You may need to think hard about the answers to this question. But here are a few possibilities.
- Great views of the sky and/or the surrounding area
- Sun trap - lovely and warm even if the weather is slightly chilly
- Sheltered from cruel winds
- Beautifully exposed so that you can enjoy all weathers
- Saves you money by offering somewhere to dry laundry without using the tumble drier
- Ideal space for storing bikes, bins, toys etc so they don’t clutter up the home
- Visited by wildlife
- Allows you to grow fruit and veg
These are all points that your garden designer will take account of when planning your new garden.
What Is Stopping You From Using Your Garden More Often?
Another important part of planning your new garden is troubleshooting. What is stopping you from using your garden at the moment. Is it overlooked by neighbours? Marred by noise from nearby roads? Dangerous? Badly drained and muddy? Too much like hard work? Or just plain boring?
Create a list of problems with your garden. Again, your garden designer will go to great pains to address each and every one of them for you.
How Would You Like To Use Your Garden?
It doesn’t matter if your garden is tiny or enormous, nothing should stop you dreaming of the ways you’d like to use it. And you may be surprised, even if you think a particular activity would be impossible in the space, your garden designer may well be able to come up with an innovative solution. Sometimes if we stand too close to a problem we can’t see a solution.
When you are writing your list of how you’d like to use your garden please don’t forget the mundane stuff. You may dream of a hot tub with an outdoor cinema and space to entertain friends. But where will you put the wheelie bin? Make the list as long as you like - the longer the better. And keep returning to it to add more activities as they spring to mind.
At this stage of planning your new garden, your focus should be on function. Don’t worry about choosing patio tiles or selecting light fittings just yet. Your garden designer needs to work out which features to include in your concept plan and where to position them in the garden.
For example, your wish list of activities might include drinking a G and T in the garden at 8pm on a Sunday evening before another weeks work. That implies a mood as well as a garden feature. Your garden designer might suggest a small patio, with a covered area and lighting, an outdoor dining area and perhaps surrounded by scented plants that give a great fragrance to evening.
Visiting Other Gardens To Set The Style.
What would you like your new garden to look like? Are your tastes minimalist or do you lean more towards a romantic look and feel? Do other members of the household have different tastes to your own? Planning a new garden means creating something for all the family to enjoy. That’s not always easy but an experienced garden designer will be able to help.
Visiting other gardens will give you a good idea of what has been done in the past. You’ll be able to evaluate different styles and features and maybe even find something that everyone in the house can agree on.
Take photos and use them to create a mood board. Use Pinterest too - it’s a great resource. And look for inspiration on social media. Ultimately planning your new garden has to be about creating a space that’s uniquely tailored to your tastes and your needs. But there’s nothing wrong in borrowing ideas from gardens that you admire.
The charity Perennial has some beautiful gardens around the UK which help raise funds for the gardener’s benevolent fund. Take a look at their website and see if there’s one near you. https://perennial.org.uk/home/gardens/
Setting A Budget For Your Garden Makeover
Planning a new garden is a bit like replacing your car - you need to have an idea of how much money you want to part with before you start the process.
Setting a budget for a garden makeover can be tricky. There’s more to a garden build than buying a few slabs and some timber from B&Q. And TV garden makeover shows tend to be very misleading with their ‘pricing’. But because every single garden build has a unique set of challenges and solutions, it’s impossible for any landscaper to give you a realistic quote without knowing what work needs to be done.
On the other hand, if your garden designer is to come up with a concept plan for an affordable garden build, they will need a rough idea of your budget.
The team here at the APL advises you to book an on-site consultation visit with a garden designer or landscaper that you trust implicitly. There may be a cost to it, but consider that as an investment. Chat about your ideas and what you need from your garden and ask your landscape professional to give you a realistic ball-park figure of what you would need to spend to realise your dreams. With that figure in mind you will be able to set a budget and arrange your finances so that you can continue planning your new garden.
Finding A Garden Designer To Help Plan Your New Garden
Designing a garden requires a mixture of art, engineering and horticulture. It’s not as simple as drawing a plan on a piece of paper and colouring it in. Designers need to safeguard your property against things like damp. In some cases, they will also need to consider local planning and building regulations. The garden must not block your neighbours’ light or intrude upon their privacy. And the plan will need to take into account slopes, existing structures, tree preservation orders and more. Designers are also legally required to work within the CDM (2015) regulations. At the same time, they must be able to conjure up a good garden design that will meet all of the client’s needs, look beautiful AND be buildable. There’s a lot to think about!
Unfortunately, at the time of writing, the UK garden design industry is unregulated. That means that anybody can buy some design software and call themselves a garden designer. Not all garden design qualifications cover the full range of skills sets required and so as a householder it can be very difficult indeed to find a reputable and competent garden designer.
Luckily there is a way to be sure that you are talking to a capable garden designer. Look for a Designer Member of the Association of Professional Landscapers (MAPL). Every garden designer on the register has passed a rigorous procedure to show that they are competent, trustworthy, and able to create unique and imaginative garden designs for any sized project.
Visit the APL home page to search for a garden designer or landscaper who can help with planning your new garden.
APL | Home (landscaper.org.uk)
