Creating your paradise on a budget
This part of the site deals with garden design ideas you can try out at home! It’s not a total plan for a garden because how many ordinary people can afford that?
I’ve never been in a position where I could sit down with a piece of paper and plan my perfect garden with expensive hard landscaping and perfect plants. Instead, my experience has been a very limited budget, where any plans had to be carried out by me, friends or family. Very few projects have been carried out by professional contractors.
This did change in 2022 when I decided to spend the last of my redundancy money on professionally futureproofing the garden against age and infirmity! The result – wooden sleeper raised beds, a raised pond made out of recycled materials and a 6’x4′ summerhouse with reclaimed York stone and gravel patio.
That’s why this garden design ideas section of the site concentrates on specific areas, based on my own cack-handed experience. They’re features like hedges, small-scale projects, or plants suitable for certain conditions.
New to gardening? The first job, do nothing
If you’ve just moved into a new house with a garden or are a new gardener with land you haven’t used before, the first rule is – DO NOTHING. Well, nothing physical, anyway. Focus on learning all you can about the plot you have. Here’s an example of an area of my garden that sees dramatic changes in the course of a year – the pond. In midwinter, you’d be excused for thinking there were no plants there, especially as the huge Rodgersia is so slow to come into leaf in spring.
Garden design ideas – 8 golden gardening rules
1. Be realistic about size
Choose plants and hard landscaping to suit the size of your plot. It’s easy to get carried away and buy small plants that will become huge. Remember Leylandii conifers in the 1970s? So many were bought in tiny pots as ‘dwarf rockery plants’ and then became 30ft monsters, sucking the moisture and nutrients from a wide area.
2. Where do you live?
The east of the UK is much drier than the west; altitude greatly affects temperature, wind, precipitation and snow. Built-up zones benefit from a ‘heat island’, so are warmer than rural areas. Coastal areas suffer greatly from salt-laden winds, but they can be much milder than inland.
I live in Gateshead – it’s one of the driest areas in the country, 114m (375ft) above sea level on a west-facing hill, but it suffers from dull, chilly summer days when cloud drifts in from the North Sea.
3. What type of soil does the garden have?
Is it clay or sandy? Acid or alkaline? If your garden surrounds a new house, it’s probably full of rubble. Get a soil testing kit to find out what you’re dealing with, as it can seriously limit what you can grow.
4. Get to know the neighbours
What problems do their gardens suffer from, and how have they dealt with them? What grows well in the neighbourhood? Does your garden sit in a frost pocket (usually at the bottom of a hill) or is it an exposed site?
5. Which direction does it face?
South and west-facing gardens are the warmest and give you the biggest range of plants. North-facing is the shadiest and coolest, while east-facing can lead to problems with early morning frost on tender shoots.
6. Make a note of where the sun shines
Your garden might be south-facing, but that’s no good if the shadow of a skyscraper blocks out the sunlight. If you can, observe over a long time – in winter, when the sun is low in the sky, hedges and walls throw long shadows – the opposite is true in summer.
7. Are there any trees?
If they’re deciduous, they will give a great opportunity for a winter and spring planting scheme before leaf burst – bulbs, hellebores, etc. However, if trees are evergreen, that’s a permanent area of dark, dry shade. If you’ve moved into a house in winter, leave the garden alone until late spring. Bear in mind that herbaceous perennials won’t show their faces until March at the earliest.
8. Base your plans around what YOU want
Is sitting out by yourself after a day of digging/pottering your dream? Then create several single seating areas. If you don’t have room, have a seat; you can move to get the sun/shade when you want. If you’re a social being, create an ‘entertainment’ area that caters to more than one disgruntled gardener.
Garden design ideas – With money, or without
Once you’ve established these basic facts, make your decisions. If money’s no option (lucky sod), get yourself a garden designer to create your perfect paradise. However, the rest of us will be on a limited (or non-existent) budget. It’s amazing what you can do with a bit of graft.
Hard landscaping is the most expensive bit, but I managed to cut that cost by digging up the lawn myself and laying gravel paths, edged with reclaimed bricks. Gravel’s cheap, easy to maintain and eco-friendly, especially if it’s local stone, as it lets rainwater percolate away naturally, unlike concrete.
Plant-wise, hardy annuals fill gaps quickly, as do easy perennials from seed and plug plants. Never miss a nursery or garden centre sale – people are put off buying plants off-season, but that’s where you’ll get tree and shrub bargains to give you a bit of structure. That’s your basic framework sketched out – it’s up to you to fill in the gaps with your own garden design ideas!
