How to Design a Garden
These days urban blocks of land are becoming very small, and planning your garden to the last square inch is an absolute necessity. A garden is more than random patches of dirt leftover when construction is finished. A garden actually starts in your mind. Long before you build.
If you are planning to build or extend a home, ask yourself (and your builder) these questions:
- Do we really need to clear all existing trees and shrubs on our property as a first step of construction?
- Naturally, every builder wants to fill a block of land entirely with house. Is that what we want? Or do we want a garden? And what percentage of the building footprint are we happy to sacrifice for a garden?
- Do we accept our builder’s blueprint to have expanses of paving or concrete where we could grow a garden instead?
- Are we happy to accept our builder’s blueprint, sit in a covered patio walled in on three sides, and call that a garden?
- Should we integrate rainwater harvesting into our building design, to supplement garden watering?
So you have – finally – moved into your new home, and you are sooo happy. Except… There’s an awful lot of Colorbond fence you are staring at… Something needs to be done. The biggest mistake people make, says a well-known Perth garden designer, is to engage a landscaping company and expect them to build a great garden for you, without any prior planning or design.
Key Considerations before Starting a Garden
If you are making a garden from scratch, ask yourself these questions before you start digging, or engage professional landscaping services:
- What do we want from our garden?
- What do we want to do in our garden?
- Do we need a lawn, for the kids or our pets?
- Are we planning to grow fruit, vegetables, and herbs?
- Is the pool we picked proportionate to the available space? Or will the pool company have a celebratory dinner after we sign the dotted line?
Another mistake is to pick images of lush green gardens from Instagram and expect these plants to work in the long, hot, dry summers of Perth. Ask yourself these questions before you go to the nursery and return with a car boot full of impulse buys:
- Do we know what style of garden we like?
- Are we prepared to install irrigation to keep our plants alive over summer? Even Australian native plants will need some water if you don’t want half of them to die like they do out in the bush.
- Have we done our research? Do we know whether the plants we want actually grow well in our area?
- Are we putting at least one tree in our garden?
- Have we ordered a verge tree from Council?
There are no right or wrong answers here, just insights into your personal lifestyle, and the kind of garden you and your family would be happy in. In other words, the fundamentals you need to design your garden.