Now that we’ve settled into our new home, it’s time to tackle the garden. Here’s a glimpse into our process as we start to transform our outdoor space, starting with the flower beds.
Chris and I love sharing parts of our lives with you all and one of the most highly requested is a tour of our garden. I wanted to make this into a blog series as we’re currently in the middle of a garden makeover and this space lets me go into much more detail than I could over on Instagram (although I’ll still be sharing snapshots on our page).
When we moved house, we intended to leave the garden for a while, but the temptation proved too big to resist! I quickly found myself tinkering away, pruning, edging, and exploring the plants we’d inherited. Ideally, we would have started planting in the spring, but better late than never. I think we’ll be grateful next year once everything has started to settle in and grow (fingers crossed!)
Our current garden has a large lawn, a relatively small sandstone patio, a Buxus hedge around perimeter, a few established trees, a huge conifer hedge, and a couple of flower beds. It’s a pleasant space, but I knew that by creating separate zones and adding a lot more planting, it could become truly amazing.
Back to the drawing board
I started by looking at the layout. Sitting at our kitchen table, I started to draw some different options that would expand the patio space, add an outdoor kitchen and dining area, build in a corner sofa, and introduce a gravel garden, morning coffee spot, and an area dedicated to the girls. These were all very rough sketches but they helped me understand what might be possible before we measured the perimeter so I could adjust the plans to scale.
Next, we started to tackle the existing flower beds. One urgently needed a little TLC; we removed some of the plants we weren’t so keen on and cut back some of the varieties that had become overgrown.
With this, the project was officially underway. We decided on the ideal shape and size for the bed and marked it out with some string and pegs to ensure the lines were all straight. We then edged the border using COR-TEN steel edging from the Ideal Garden. It wasn’t the easiest thing to install at first, but we soon found a rhythm that worked. I love the finished product and know it’ll only look better as it ages. Some have asked why we didn’t make the steel flush to the ground for easier lawn mowing, but I felt it would be such a shame to hide it! The steel’s stunning finish deserves to be seen and I really like the idea of geraniums spilling over the raised edges as they grow.
Pinterest and planning
When it comes to buying plants, I like to take my time and get organised. Otherwise, visits to the garden centre can quickly get out of hand as I let my imagination take over and end up taking home armfuls of plants with no specific theme or placement in mind.
In our old garden, I found that I could create a sense of structure and consistency by repeating the same plants along the length of the borders and in other parts of the garden. In this new space, I knew I wanted to plant a lush border with lots of zesty greens, beautiful purple shades, my favourite roses, and some statement trees.
I set about making a Pinterest board to build a shortlist of plants that would thrive with our soil (clay) and sun positioning (a mix of full sun and shade) and take seasonality into consideration. It can be tempting to buy the garden centre plants that are in full bloom (I’ve made this mistake before) but ideally, you want to have a range of varieties that will flower from March to October.
Most plant websites will let you filter by soil type, sun positioning, and flowering period. I ended up with a Gantt chart that plotted when the plants would be in bloom and where I had gaps. At the moment, things are looking a little sparse in early spring, so I’m planning to add some spring bulbs this autumn (more details to come).
Now, back to the fun bit. I found it quite difficult to stick to my initial plan of having repeated plants as there are so many beautiful varieties to choose from. I’m happy with my decisions but one of the things I love most about gardening is that it allows for some trial and error. Even if something doesn’t work out as you hoped, you can learn from it and make changes.
Seasonal variations
Once I had a wish list of plants, I made a mood board to understand how all the colours would work together. I loved the combination of purples and greens, but to help them pop, I added a splash of pink with some David Austin roses and Scabious and introduced some white from Hydrangea ‘Annabelle’ and Viburnum opulus. Many of the plants I’ve selected are relatively low maintenance perennials, which means they’ll die back each winter, before resurfacing in spring, so our flower beds will look a little bare during winter months. To help offset this, I’ve added some evergreen spheres using Green Spire as well as some ornamental grasses.
We bought most of our plants in local garden centres and had some very kindly gifted by Crocus. We needed quite a few as the border is 20 metres long and 2 metres deep, so we chose smaller, less established plants to make it as cost-effective as possible. There are still plenty of gaps, and I’m sure we’ll add more in the coming months and years, but I’m thrilled with how it’s coming together and can’t wait to watch it grow.
I’ve compiled a complete list of the plants we’ve used and how they’ve been laid out below. I hope you’ve found this useful if you’ve just started to plan your own outdoor space and I’ll be sure to keep you updated with how the beds fare as well as any further changes in the garden.
Lots of love,
Ashlee x
