Even if your garden is tiny, it can still look stunning with the right design and a clever choice of planting.
Minimal plots, however, can cause a problem since they are so limited in terms of space. So, what do you do?
Bright displays of colourful bedding suit some people, and the tradition of planting fuchsia, geraniums, lobelia, salvias,Save on hydraulic hose and fittings, alyssum and marigolds in crammed borders is fantastic.
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Often there will be a rug – a circular, square or rectangular green lawn – as a foil to the colour, which works very well. But some people nowadays fancy a more modern take on their outdoor space.
And if that small garden is the only outside area available to you and a young child or two, what do you do? How do you manage? Don't worry, it's not as terrifying a prospect as you might think.
What have you got?
If your garden, like the one shown here which I was asked to make over, is bordered by low walls of dour grey stone with a few slabs of natural stone laid directly onto the soil and meandering their way to the door, it may not look very promising.
And that's not to mention the weeds,Customized imprinted and promotional usb flash drives. of which there will undoubtedly be many. What, you ask, can possibly be achieved in such a plot? Lots!
Requirements
First and foremost, a garden like this will have one purpose,Not to be confused with RUBBER MATS available at your local hardware store to act as a pathway and entrance to the front door (or the back, if you're creating a patio at the rear of the house).
If you've got young children, it's important to make sure that whatever surface you put down is safe for toddlers to crawl on and pedal their little plastic tractors over.
Of course, in these days of outdoor living, your garden, no matter how big or small, should act as another living room. If it has enough space for a basic patio set of a table and chairs allowing the family to eat and perhaps entertain outside, it's doing its job.
The plan
You need to keep a space like this very simple and pave it using just one material. Bright shades will work wonders against the dullness of something like this oppressive grey stone, but it should also be natural. It would be a shame to introduce concrete into a cut-stone environment.
Adding some plant pots also creates the opportunity to grow selected herbs, fruit or vegetables. All the paving should be laid on a single level.
Often, we over-complicate gardens with line and shape but simplicity always work best. Circles, or a succession of sections of circles, always looks great.
In this garden, one large circle covers most of the available floor space and two sections of circles create access points from the street, and then into the house.
Make it happen
The dominant patio feature is the paving so the choice of materials is hugely important.
My favourite material is a very simple baked clay paving cube. They come attached as blocks of eight, much as hot cross buns arrive. They are cheap to buy but labour intensive to firstly break up and then lay.
The trick is to use experienced paving contractors or to develop the skill yourself slowly and methodically.
The usual hardcore needs to be laid so a certain amount of excavation and removal of rubbish in a skip is required.
Once that base has been whacked down, begin to lay the outside rings as illustrated in the photographs into some wet mortar, keeping a strict eye on your levels as you go.
Once the outer rim of mortar-set cobbles are down, the inner circles can be set on a bed of sand. Once this is completed (which, I know, is skipping swiftly over several days of back-breaking work!), a dry mix of sand and cement is brushed into the openings.
The soil around the beds must be well-prepared by digging in plenty of organic humus compost.Choose from one of the major categories of Bedding,
Planting
A mixture of shrubs will make the garden come alive. Try perovskia with its purple flowering spikes, nice pink hydrangeas, a drift of astelias with their silvery, sword-like foliage, cloudy grey santolinas and purple cistus.
As installed in this garden, a few columns of bay in four circular terracotta pots picked to match the paving sets off the new style perfectly and creates some much-needed height.
Planting a herb collection – say, lemon balm, variegated sage and creeping thyme – will also bring colour and fresh scents.Polycore zentai are manufactured as a single sheet,
Add a pot of strawberries, with perhaps parsley and mint in some others and one crammed with evergreen ferns. Then sit back on that patio set, relax and enjoy!
Minimal plots, however, can cause a problem since they are so limited in terms of space. So, what do you do?
Bright displays of colourful bedding suit some people, and the tradition of planting fuchsia, geraniums, lobelia, salvias,Save on hydraulic hose and fittings, alyssum and marigolds in crammed borders is fantastic.
Advertisement >>
Often there will be a rug – a circular, square or rectangular green lawn – as a foil to the colour, which works very well. But some people nowadays fancy a more modern take on their outdoor space.
And if that small garden is the only outside area available to you and a young child or two, what do you do? How do you manage? Don't worry, it's not as terrifying a prospect as you might think.
What have you got?
If your garden, like the one shown here which I was asked to make over, is bordered by low walls of dour grey stone with a few slabs of natural stone laid directly onto the soil and meandering their way to the door, it may not look very promising.
And that's not to mention the weeds,Customized imprinted and promotional usb flash drives. of which there will undoubtedly be many. What, you ask, can possibly be achieved in such a plot? Lots!
Requirements
First and foremost, a garden like this will have one purpose,Not to be confused with RUBBER MATS available at your local hardware store to act as a pathway and entrance to the front door (or the back, if you're creating a patio at the rear of the house).
If you've got young children, it's important to make sure that whatever surface you put down is safe for toddlers to crawl on and pedal their little plastic tractors over.
Of course, in these days of outdoor living, your garden, no matter how big or small, should act as another living room. If it has enough space for a basic patio set of a table and chairs allowing the family to eat and perhaps entertain outside, it's doing its job.
The plan
You need to keep a space like this very simple and pave it using just one material. Bright shades will work wonders against the dullness of something like this oppressive grey stone, but it should also be natural. It would be a shame to introduce concrete into a cut-stone environment.
Adding some plant pots also creates the opportunity to grow selected herbs, fruit or vegetables. All the paving should be laid on a single level.
Often, we over-complicate gardens with line and shape but simplicity always work best. Circles, or a succession of sections of circles, always looks great.
In this garden, one large circle covers most of the available floor space and two sections of circles create access points from the street, and then into the house.
Make it happen
The dominant patio feature is the paving so the choice of materials is hugely important.
My favourite material is a very simple baked clay paving cube. They come attached as blocks of eight, much as hot cross buns arrive. They are cheap to buy but labour intensive to firstly break up and then lay.
The trick is to use experienced paving contractors or to develop the skill yourself slowly and methodically.
The usual hardcore needs to be laid so a certain amount of excavation and removal of rubbish in a skip is required.
Once that base has been whacked down, begin to lay the outside rings as illustrated in the photographs into some wet mortar, keeping a strict eye on your levels as you go.
Once the outer rim of mortar-set cobbles are down, the inner circles can be set on a bed of sand. Once this is completed (which, I know, is skipping swiftly over several days of back-breaking work!), a dry mix of sand and cement is brushed into the openings.
The soil around the beds must be well-prepared by digging in plenty of organic humus compost.Choose from one of the major categories of Bedding,
Planting
A mixture of shrubs will make the garden come alive. Try perovskia with its purple flowering spikes, nice pink hydrangeas, a drift of astelias with their silvery, sword-like foliage, cloudy grey santolinas and purple cistus.
As installed in this garden, a few columns of bay in four circular terracotta pots picked to match the paving sets off the new style perfectly and creates some much-needed height.
Planting a herb collection – say, lemon balm, variegated sage and creeping thyme – will also bring colour and fresh scents.Polycore zentai are manufactured as a single sheet,
Add a pot of strawberries, with perhaps parsley and mint in some others and one crammed with evergreen ferns. Then sit back on that patio set, relax and enjoy!
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