Garden Makeover

And Tuesday Twirl

Is This Mutton shares a garden transformation

Dear friends. Today I'm sharing our big garden makeover. We were keen to make the back garden more child friendly, and for me, less work.

The renovation happened in the dreary month of March.

Let's look at the Before pictures first.

The raised beds sleepers were starting to rot. I was fed up with the three monster clematis on the fence. The patio was uneven and poor quality, and the garage exterior needed renovation.

The decking and arbour were in a very bad condition. We didn't like the grandchildren going down the end of the garden.

A couple of very old trees were misshapen and high maintenance. I didn't like losing them, but the light in the garden has increased enormously. The fence on the right was in danger of falling over. There was a forsythia hedge (not seen) which was on its last legs.

Now for the makeover. We went for a clean, open look, extending the (artificial) grass and installing a new patio and fencing. You may ask why artificial grass? The garden is north facing and when it had real grass it was difficult to make it look good. It became water logged and mossy. We first had the artificial grass in 2012 and found it didn't discourage wildlife. It's much better for the children to play on.

Above: the sand is laid for the grass. Below: the new beds, grass, patio and fencing are finished.

The first plants - the exciting part!

I acquired two extra raised beds. In the main bed, as before, I planted mostly perennials which previously thrived (lupins, salvia, dianthus, scabiosa). The picture below was from May.

The top picture shows the main bed in August with additional plants including verbena Bonariensis and sedums to attract bees.

Below: the bed is running alongside the garage has two roses, Anne Boleyn and Princess Anne, and colourful annuals.

"Shed Corner" had a few containers with dahlias but they weren't as good as they should have been because of our holidays and not enough watering.

This bed, below, is for spring bulbs, which I'll be planting soon, and heuchera.

One thing I've noticed is that the very hot summer, and the fact that we've opened up the garden considerably, means I could now consider plants which like direct sunshine. So next year I will experiment a bit more. Behind the shed there used to be a very large leylandii tree, but the neighbours have now got rid of it, exposing a cute white birch which has emerged blinking in the sunshine.

Two casualties of the hot weather were the clematis I planted in April. They were not the Montana type. I'm going to try different varieties including the evergreen Clematis Armandii.

The roses, which are mostly in the front garden, have LOVED the hot weather. Today we have had prolonged rain, for the first time in months. They have flowered prolifically since April and I've had none of the usual problems with black spot. There are two varieties, both from David Austin English Roses: Gertrude Jekyll and Scepter'd Isle.

Overall we are very pleased with the transformation. J enjoys sitting out in the garden reading, and I'm constantly out there dead heading and weeding.

Hope you enjoyed seeing the flowers. I'll share in a few weeks my bulb choices, as this is always a highlight of the year.

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