Themed
Areas of gravel create the perfect base for a Japanese garden.
Assessing your garden
A successful garden is nearly always a marriage of what you actually have and what you would like to have. The first step is to spend time in the garden. Look at the space, the levels, the walls and so on, and then decide what you want from your garden. Do you like gardening, or do you simply want to enjoy being outdoors? Consider your finances and your physical capabilities. Generally think through the possibilities and then slowly begin to make plans.
Where do I start?
Design the garden so that it makes the most of the sun.
SIZE
Garden size is relative. If you are not very keen on gardening and just want a space to relax and read a book, 0.2 of a hectare (half an acre) is a huge area, but if you want to grow all your own vegetables then the same area is perhaps a bit poky. Big, small, long or wide, treat the space like a room in your house and make the most of all the existing features.
SHAPE
Making the most of an unusually shaped space – thin, wide, triangular, L-shaped, or whatever – can result in a uniquely exciting garden. A difficult corner plot can be a problem, but then again such a shape offers you the chance to create a really unusual garden, one that stands out from its neighbours.
EXTREMELY SLOPING SITES
Extremely sloping sites can be great fun. You have three options. In ascending order of sweat and expense, you can make something of it as is, you can build raised decking to create level patio areas, and, most difficult of all, you can create one or more terraces. If you want terraces but need to keep costs down, and don’t mind hard work, the best option is to cut and move the existing soil.
ORIENTATION
Stand in the garden at various times of the day, and look at the house and the trees and the position of the sun. As you cannot move the house within the site, you have no choice other than to design the garden so that it makes the most of what is on offer in the way of sun, shade and privacy. Decide, for example, if you want the patio in full sun, or the vegetable plot in full sun and yet out of sight of the house.
EXPOSED SITES
Ordinary garden plants hate wind. The key to creating a garden on an exposed site is to build as many windbreaks as possible – walls, fences, sheds and the like – and then to grow tough plants on the lea or sheltered side of the breaks. Once the plants are established, the enclosed space will be that much warmer and draught-free – a good environment for a whole range of medium to fully hardy plants.
SOIL TYPES
To a great extent, you have no choice but to work with your soil – its particular type and conditions. The soil type will influence what you can grow. Don’t worry too much about its pH (whether it is acid or alkaline); just take note of whether it is sandy, wet, dry, clay or rocky, and then look around at your locality and choose plants that will thrive in that type of soil.
LARGE PERMANENT FEATURES
In most instances, you have to work around large permanent features such as a huge tree, the back of a neighbour’s shed, a tall wall that overlooks the garden or a streetlight. If you don’t like the back of the neighbour’s shed, then why not block it out with a shed of your own, a trellis covered with a vigorous climbing plant, or a tall, attractive fence? Try to use the back of the shed to your advantage.
YOU AND YOUR GARDEN
The wonderful thing about gardens is that they give you the chance to create your own private haven. Of course, you do have to consider the needs of friends and neighbours, but first and foremost you must start by identifying your own needs – all the things that you do and don’t want.
Balcony gardens
The best way of coping with a cramped balcony garden is to use a variety of containers; these may be fixed to the balustrade, used as windowboxes, hanging from the walls, arranged in tiers or in groups on the floor, placed in groups just inside the door to the house, and so on. Use container plants to blur the boundaries between the inside and outside space.
Roof gardens
Much depends upon the size of your roof garden, but as a generalization it is always a good decision to spend on a quality floor such as tiles or decking, really good furniture, and as many pots and containers as you can get into the space.
IDEAS SUITED TO THE TYPES OF GARDEN
Your garden might well be, in some way or other, uniquely tricky, but the good news is that there will be all sorts of exciting ideas and options that you can use to best advantage.
Small shady garden with moist soil Try a woodland theme with a small sitting area or ‘glade’ positioned to catch available patches of sunshine. Go for woodland plants that positively enjoy damp shady conditions, like ferns, ivies, some grasses and bamboos, hostas, Polygonatum, primulas and hydrangeas.
Small shady garden with dry soil A good idea is a woodland glade theme with shrubs and trees like fuchsias, Parthenocissus (Virginia creeper) and Acers (Japanese Maples) around the borders. Have a large patch of lawn for the ‘glade’. Extend the woodland glade theme by spreading a mulch of woodchip around the shrubs and trees.
Small sunny garden with dry soil Position a chalet or bower so that it catches most of the sunshine, and then have a small pool with appropriate planting. You could have Eichhornia (Water Hyacinth), Aponogeton distachyos (Water Hawthorn) and a whole range of lilies.
Sloping garden with stony soil Take advantage of the stony conditions by making the garden into one large alpine rock garden. Bring in large feature rocks and stone troughs, and grow alpine plants like Thyme, Sedum (Stonecrop), Iberis (Candytuft) and Phlox subulata (Moss Phlox).
Large garden with wet clay soil Turn the whole garden into one big water garden with a large natural pond at the centre and areas of bog garden to catch the runoff from the pond. Have all the usual plants in the pond, with the marginals around the pond blurring into bog plants like irises, primulas, ferns and Hemerocallis (Daylilies).
Garden with back-to-back houses Position a chalet at the bottom of the garden, with trellis to each side, and then plant climbers to grow over it. You could concentrate on Clematis – search out the various spring, summer, autumn and winter varieties
