Did I call this lawn? Those 'weeds' are cat's ears (second photo) and I don't mind them, in fact I want them for the meadowy look, but that moss!  I thought I could leave it for a year but there will be hardly any grass there by next year. I will scarify it in April (good exercise!).

The mini meadow usually gets cut late July or August but I never did find the energy for it last year. Strimming it is first on the list and I will pay the man who put up the greenhouse to do it. The proceeds from the last big painting I sold are earmarked for garden help.  :-)

The patio/seating area is really important to me. 15 minutes with a bicarbonate of soda and vinegar mix, a cloth and the hose got rid of the algae... ....though it was too cold to sit down to drink the coffee.

The sitting area is on gravel. I let lots of things self-seed there (that 'relaxed look' you will be hearing a lot about!)  It's not difficult after rain to take out the surplus. It is full of quaking grass and after they got soaked with the hose as I rinsed off the table I potted a few up and put them in the greenhouse along with the sweet peas in their root trainers.

Snow all around, blue tits checking out the bird boxes and the first seeds- night scented stock - sown on Saturday and up on Wednesday!

If you too are a gardener, what are the first couple of items on your list of wants and needs, and have you decided what is needed to get them ready for the new season?

See original post here.
Here is my own list.

I don't want any additional features and may get rid of one or two which I already have.

Lawn
Patio
Garden furniture
Ornament/sculpture
Bird bath
Flower borders
Cutting patch
hedges/fences
Shed
Greenhouse
Compost heaps
Herb garden

The lawns are very mossy! But I will live with that for this year. I plan to allow more areas to grow longer for a meadowy/wilder effect and to cut down on mowing time. See this post

I have suggested you photograph your garden 'warts and all' to aid the design process. If it is not snowing again tomorrow I will do just that!

Have you considered each of the Six Honest Serving Men?

What, Why When, How Where and Who?

Here are some more questions in no particular order -

How long do you expect to stay in this house?
How much are you prepared to/able to spend?
Will you get professional help?
What will be your time scale for the design?
Will you phase it over a period?
What will be your order of priorities?
Which views will you focus on or screen?
If you have lost any plants over the last season or two do you know why?
Have you done a soil test? (Inexpensive kit is fine.)
Do you know where north is?
Will you draw a plan to scale? Even a rough sketch is helpful.
Do you have someone who will water while you are away?

Lots of practicalities and perhaps the illusion of control....but maybe what we are after in a garden is the daily and intimate contact with the miracle of nature....right on our doorstep, the newly opened flower, the bee, the butterfly, the scents and colour - a garden is a sensual experience, and should have an element of enchantment and joy.

Your garden design that is..

If you've been following my Design Your Own Garden course (begun 3rd September under Simply Grow) you may appreciate a reality check!

Here are two important questions -

How much time would you be prepared or able to spend once any major work was done?

1 - 2 hours per week
2 - 4 hours per week
Some evenings and part of most weekends
Most of your spare time

Who would do any major work? You or a contractor?

In the light of your answers to this you may want to modify your plans. As an example - for one client who wanted a Romantic garden but worked full-time and could not afford help, I designed a Romantic Corner and kept the rest very simple; for another who wished he had a bigger garden I opened up the views to the surrounding countryside and managed the boundaries so that the 'borrowed view' appeared to be part of the garden, with no extra work required.

Thinking outside the box is good at this stage. For example you might swap skills with someone who can help you do the work which is physically too demanding for you.

Or perhaps have a beautifully shaped tree which is now blocking a path. You are thinking of pruning the tree, but you might be better moving the path....
Mull over all the possibilities, browse the web, visit or revisit with a more analytical eye gardens you love, ask everyone's opinion (if you are sure you won't be too easily swayed from your own preferences). Ask yourself why you like what you like as well as how can you achieve it.


Think things through. Take your time - a week, a month, a season.

I keep saying take your time, so I'll leave this post up for a few days!


Next post - keeping the dream and getting practical - you need both!

Now is your chance to start gathering favourite images online or from magazines for your own garden file - indulge your imagination as you answer the question..

How would you describe your ideal garden?

Romantic
Restful
Dramatic
Tidy
Private/secluded
Traditional
Attractive to wildlife
Muted in colour
Very colourful
Labour saving
Innovative/imaginative
Low maintenance
Other?

I am liking a little on the wild side..

Here are two nice, and important questions!

What do you like most about your garden?

What do you like least?

Take your time over this one....

The privacy, the view, the good soil, a special tree....

One of my favourite things is the view - it's known in design terms as 'borrowed landscape' and one of the lovely things about it is I don't have to look after it..

OK it's time to own up - here is my least favourite bit! The dumping ground at the back of the shed. But watch this space...

I have been posting questions I ask clients when I am commissioned to design a garden - so they will amount to an online Design Your Own Garden Course if you like to follow all the suggestions!

Here is the fourth question I ask. The answers of course are not just ticking the box - a lot of discussion goes on at this stage - perhaps you can discuss the questions with someone?

This one is another check list -

What kind of plants do you want?

Trees
Shrubs
Herbaceous perennials
Annuals/biennials
Scented flowers
Groundcover
Climbers
Evergreens
Topiary
Foliage interest
Alpines
Flowers for cutting
Flowers to attract wildlife/birds/butterflies
Containers with bedding
Bulbs
Exotics
Other?

Don't tick them all! Unless you have a lot of space and a gardener (or two.)

Flowers for picking are a priority for me - even if just tiny posies..

I am posting a Design Your Own Garden course here I realise....

This is a checklist I devised to go through with clients who commission a garden design. (Previous posts under Simply Grow on sidebar)

Which of these features would you want or need?

Lawn
Vegetable plot
Patio
Pergola
Raised beds
Pool
Pond
Barbecue
Garden furniture
Ornament/sculpture
Bird bath
Flower borders
Cutting patch
Hedges/fences
Play area
Sand pit
Herb garden
Shed/storage
Greenhouse
Summerhouse
Compost heap
Deck
Washing line
Extra storage for bikes/canoes etc
Other?

You may like to make a garden file with your answers to the questions (there are more to come).

Photographs of your garden as it is now will be helpful...not 'arty' photographs just a warts-and-all record of every part of it.

When do you use the garden most?

All day, mornings, evenings, weekends, hardly ever....it's a good idea to think about when you make use of your outdoor space as well as what for (yesterday's question).

It can help with decisions about how much to spend - not much if you only sit out on a Sunday morning, more if you and/or your children spend most of your waking hours out there, where to position your sitting area - which areas get sun or shade and at what time of day, what kind of plants to grow eg plants with evening scent if you are out at work all day, whether to create more privacy in the eating or sunbathing area if your neighbours are home all day, where to put the children's play area if they mostly use it after school - is it visible from the window while you prepare the meal?

If you have a garden, and if you are planning or redesigning one, I thought I would share some of the questions I ask clients before I begin work...

Question one -  What would you like to use the garden for?

To sit in, look at, hide in, grow your own food, let the children run free, grow flowers to pick for the house, add to the value of the property, attract wildlife, eat and drink in, sunbathe nude.........  Make your list as long as you like.

Then prioritise, as it's probable that not all your dreams will be fulfilled in one garden!

Continuing a look at my garden, border by border. (I will file all these posts under Simply Low Maintenance for easy reference.)

This border which is in the middle of the garden does have that wow factor I seek, which is surprising really as it is a muddle of plants. I have just been out to count how many different things are in this bed which is about 6m x2m. NIneteen! Oh, twenty if I count the underplanting of daffodils!

A bit like clutter in the house it just creeps up on me - a self-sown seedling or three, a gift just popped in there for now, a reserve of something I didn't quite know what to do with yet, an impulse buy I didn't really have a plan for, some are so buried by more vigorous stuff the whole season goes by without me seeing them - none of these good reasons for keeping them!

Here is what I'll keep - Cornus controversa variegata (the horizontal shrub/tree) and the shrub rosa glauca, geranium psilostemnon, geranium 'Patricia', one good clump of alchemilla mollis, one plant of geranium Rozanne to continue the adjacent border, campanula lactiflora 'Anna Lodden'.

Here is what I will remove - Iris sibirica, aquilegia (Maybe. They are no work and don't crowd out other things), anemone japonica, pulmonaria 'Blue Ensign', Erysimum 'Bowles Mauve' (these last two were the ones which got buried), pink campion, angelica, a small geranium whose name I have forgotten, geranium praetense....

I'd like to plant more daffodil 'Thalia' in this bed. I shall just have to risk damaging existing bulbs when I plant them.

The plan is to cut everything hard back in autumn, lift them in spring - I may have a big plant sale! - and space the others well,. and mulch with composted bark.

A little pruning our of dead wood on the rose and cutting back the perennials late in the year should then be all that is required.

Are you making your garden lower maintenance, or is that not a priority for you just now?

..with the WOW factor!

It should be possible, shouldn't it, to have a garden that looks fabulous but doesn't take up every minute of your time and all your energy and too much of your money?

(I have just agreed to open my garden again for charity in 2018 under Scotland's Gardens Scheme.)

So, a new category, Simply Low Maintenance.

Any ideas for a better title? The very words Low Maintenance when applied to gardening make me think boring - static dwarf conifers, slabs, hard landscaping....

The first thing I will do is list the plants I love which give the most impact for the least work.

I already have a good structure with two - betula Jacqumontii, the white-bark birch. The impact comes from the fact that we planted ten of them in quite a small space. Three cornus controversa variegata provide a dramatic horizontal contrast to these. See this post.

I would go so far as to say that these are no maintenance, so that's a good start!