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Whether you are looking to sell your home or are just longing for a beautiful garden space that you can relax and entertain in, landscape gardening is an ideal way to create a paradise outside your own back door. 87% of adults in the UK think that gardens benefit their state of mind,[1] and they’d be right – spending the majority of your time indoors can be detrimental to both your mental and physical health, and what better way to encourage you and your family out into your garden than by crafting it into an attractive space for all to admire?
Completely revamping your garden into an appealing, varied environment might seem like quite a daunting concept, but it allows you to design the space exactly the way you want it and gives you complete control over how things get done. To help you understand more about landscape gardening and how you could go about doing it yourself, we’ve put together a handy guide to get you on the way to redesigning your garden in no time.
What Is Landscape Gardening?
Before we delve into how you can go about landscaping your garden, it’s important for you to understand what landscape gardening actually is. Landscaping a garden means designing or arranging it in a natural but decorative way, and not only does this include shrubbery but also things like furniture, fencing, pathways, decking and ponds. Landscape gardening involves taking care of every bit of the garden, from outlining the structural aspects down to choosing what flowers and plants will go into it.
A gardener and a landscape gardener are two different things – gardeners focus solely on keeping plants, whereas landscape gardeners often specialize in outdoor building work and architectural features, though some landscape gardeners may offer a few gardening services and vice versa.
How To Landscape Your Garden
The best time to landscape your garden is in winter, when you won’t disturb it, but summer is the best time to plan and understand what you want your design to be, so don’t rush yourself, especially in the planning stages. Designing your garden is similar to drawing up a plan for a room inside your house, so if you approach it in the same way you will find it easier to break it down and sort out all the elements. Here are our tips to get you started.
1) Have A Plan
To start your landscaping journey, the best thing for you to do is your research. Try looking around public gardens, other people’s gardens and garden centres for inspiration, and never underestimate a good Google search to find some specific ideas and examples. Use this stimulus to formulate your own plan of what you want to put in your garden and what you want it to look like – you could create sketches or mood boards to help you visualise your end goal. Keep in mind the space you have when you are planning the things you want to put in or do to your garden – you don’t want to overfill it as this will make it feel cramped.
Some things you should consider when you are brainstorming landscaping ideas include:
- Walls
- Fences
- Hedges
- Pathways
- Decking
- Lawns
- Plants/trees
- Outdoor lighting
- Furniture
2) Match it With Your Home
Everyone’s house is different in style and design, and it’s important to keep the architectural style of your house in mind when you’re planning the look of your garden because you don’t want the styles to clash. For example, if you live in a minimalist, open plan home it wouldn’t make sense for the garden to be walled in and filled with overgrown flowerbeds as this closed – in, cramped space wouldn’t match with the house style. If you see your garden and home as one unit rather than separate parts, it will help you match the styles, so they work better together aesthetically and suggest the same lifestyle as the house.
3) Nurture Your Lawn
Don’t neglect your lawn in the midst of all your design excitement – a well looked after patch can make a property feel more spacious and open, so keep your grass healthy, well looked after and properly mown. It’s also a good idea to edge your lawn to keep it looking neat and tidy. All you have to do for this is to go around the edge of the lawn to make the distinction between the two more obvious and cleaning up any overgrown bits that may have escaped your mower last time. Although it might not seem it, a clean lawn can make all the difference in a garden.
4) Try Zoning
People are spending much more of their time outside now, and when landscaping your garden it could be worthwhile to compartmentalize the space into sections, with each section devoted to different things such as socialising, relaxing, working or dining. A patio or decking area is a perfect example of this, as most people use these areas when they have guests over. Separating out zones in your garden like this helps you to make more use of the space and makes it a more relaxing environment – use things like patios, fences, walls, planters or screens to establish different areas and make the garden feel more spacious.
5) Furnish The Garden
Just like an interior room, the way you furnish your garden can make it look more appealing and engaging. If you plan on using zones, placing furniture like BBQs, benches, tables, seats and other accessories to show how you expect the different parts of your garden to be used sets the atmosphere, but if you aren’t separating your space in that way make sure that your furniture is placed aptly and try not to cram when planning your layout. Ensure your furniture fits with the overall style of the garden and house and try not to cram when planning your layout – these stylish banana benches are a great fashionable, compact choice for houses of any design.
6) Add Colour
Utilising colour in your landscape design is a great way to give your garden a boost and create an overall more attractive space. There are many easy ways for you to incorporate colour into your garden including choosing colourful:
- Plants
- Plant pots
- Fences
- Walls
- Accessories
- Furniture
- Water features
- Lights
Remember, though, when you’re choosing colours, that you still want your garden to match the design of your house, so the shades you use to spruce up the space need to fit in with this style.
Hiring A Landscape Gardener
If your garden is particularly messy or you don’t trust yourself to completely landscape your own, you always have the option to hire a professional landscape gardener. If you do, you can be guaranteed a professional finish and a garden to be proud of, although it may cost you depending on what you want doing.
What Does A Landscape Gardener Do?
A landscape gardener will rejuvenate your garden into a functional, attractive space for you. The landscape gardeners approach would be different to yours if you were to design your garden yourself – they would discuss your wants for the project, produce some design examples for you to check over, and then take complete responsibility for regenerating your garden by getting the equipment and materials necessary, planting anything that needs to be planted, looking after the lawn and soil, building fences, laying decking or slabs, putting up gazebos, and even adding in lighting and furniture if they offer these services.
How Much Do Landscape Gardeners Charge?
The cost of bringing in a landscape gardener depends on what you want them to do and who you choose to do it. It’s hard to give an estimate per garden as all gardens are different, so here are the average prices for jobs landscape gardeners are commonly asked to do.
- A patio – £100 per m²
- Remove a patio and replace it with lawn – £60 per m²
- Decking – £100 – £125 per m²
- Fencing – £50 – £100 per m, plus extra for good quality fence panels
- Brick wall – £54 per m
- Raised vegetable beds – £30 – £130 per m²
- Pond – £400 – £800 for 1.5m diameter
- Rockery – £300 – £500[2]
It’s always best to compare quotes before settling as prices in your area may differ from these estimates, plus getting several figures could mean the difference in a few hundred pounds. If you’re on a tight budget, try and do as much of it as you can by yourself, then you only have to pay for someone else to do the hard features for you.
Get Stuck In
Sometimes, the worst thing about something like landscape gardening is just getting started – when you’re staring at your expanse of a garden, it’s easy to think it’ll be too hard and just go back inside. But take each part step by step and stick to your plan, and you’ll be halfway to your design goal before you even realise it. Although it may seem hard now, the benefits you will reap from a landscaped garden will be great and varied, and the self-fulfilment from knowing that you have taken part in making it look the way it does will be beyond words.
Do you have any further suggestions about landscape gardening? Let us know!
Sources
[1] https://hta.org.uk/industry-data/garden-statistics.html
[2] https://tradesmencosts.co.uk/garden-landscaping/
Anna is the marketing and office manager for Garden Benches – a premium supplier of high-quality wooden benches and other outdoor furniture.
