11 Essential things to consider before building your garden

Before you embark on any gardening scheme it is essential that you realize how you wish the finished garden to look. This does not mean that you cannot build your garden by installments - you can, but only if you have planned it all beforehand. You must decide what features you want from the outset.   

Many gardens are neat in the sense that the lawns are cut, the beds are weed-free and the bushes are pruned, and individual beds may even have been planned or at least have had their finished format sketched on a piece of paper, but, taken as a whole, the garden may be a jumble of ideas with no cohesion to them. This is the inevitable conse­quence of starting work without an overall plan. You must be able to see the total concept in your mind's eye before a single sod is turned. 

Your first step is to decide which features are most important to you, your family and your life­style; then decide upon your favorite plants and the role that the garden has to fulfill. The items that must be considered before you actually reach the stage of producing a plan include: 

1. How large is the plot? Realize all of the possibilities and the limitations. 

2. What are the natural features of the plot - is it flat or on a slope; is it dry land or wet land; is it exposed or sheltered? 

3. How much time do you wish to spend in the garden maintaining it? Do you wish to reduce this to a minimum or is it going to become an important part of your life? 

4. How much money is available to spend upon the garden? Gardening is a multi-million pound industry, and there are ways to make all tasks simpler, and plants and items to suit all tastes - at a price! It’s possible to create an almost 'instant' garden, by placing out plants bought in their prime and replacing them when they have served their purpose, but the cost is liable to be completely unreasonable. You may think it is impossible to produce a designer landscape without spending a fortune, but this is not the case.  

You may propagate virtually all your own plants at minimal cost, and there are other ways of effecting savings such as planting trees and shrubs during the dormant season rather than purchasing the more expensive container-grown specimens.

Container-grown plants do have their uses - the building of the garden can take many months and it may be advantageous to plant some trees and bushes during the summer to provide the necessary continuity in the work, saving a year's growing time. Where bedding plants and other plants that need replacing each season are to be used, it will be necessary to include a greenhouse in the overall layout to avoid high on-going expenses. 

5. Do you wish the garden to remain the same throughout the year, with only the seasonal change of the individual permanent plants altering, or do you wish to change the displays with the seasons? 

6. Do you wish to grow a crop in the garden? Whilst vegetables are not grown as much as they once were, with the increased interest in organically-grown foods there may be a return to this type of gardening.

If you see yourself as a would-be back garden farmer you should give serious thought to renting an allotment, which can be done at a very modest cost. Fruit can be grown in even the smallest gardens thanks to modern root-stocks which dwarf the growth of the tree.  

Alternatively, there are well-established methods of growing trees along walls, and these often produce the finest crops of all. Blooms for the house may well be incorporated into any scheme, providing that you choose the 'cut and come again' species such as dahlia or sweet pea. 

7. Will the garden have to work in other ways? Will you want it to provide dining-out areas and play areas for children? 

8. Do you have any favorite features? You must decide from the outset which features you wish to incorporate in the garden. Ponds, rockeries and herbaceous borders are all contenders for space, and subjects such as sundials and statuettes can be considered as focal points. It is not possible to mix styles unless you decide to divide the garden into a series of screened-off sections.

This will only work if the plot is of sufficient size and it will also tend to be labor-­intensive. Do not fall into the trap of overcrowding. If you reduce the size of each section, trying to fit several styles into the space available, the reduced space will probably mean that none of the ideas will work. 

9. Do you intend to do the work yourself or will you employ a landscape gardener? Even if you do employ assistance you should be in control of the situation at all stages. There are many landscape gardeners who are good, and who will give you a successful plan, with useful suggestions as to how your own ideas can be put into practice.

Unfortunately, there are also professionals of limited imagination and ability, who will try to force their views on how the garden should be developed. Remember, they may be more concerned with their profit margins than with your garden.  

The size and shape of a pond or the creation of a rockery all allow for a very profitable mark-up and this may be their first consideration. There is no foolproof way of ensuring that anyone you employ is absolutely reliable, but a good workman should have no objection to providing you with a list of his previous customers to whom you can telephone for recommendations. 

10. Can you do manual work at present and will you be able to in the foreseeable future? Gardening should be a pleasure not a chore. 

11. What degree of permanence do you wish the features to possess? It is said that both pears and walnuts are planted for our grandchildren, but such features may be considered out of place in a time when we all have a far greater degree of mobility. It has also been suggested that some modern homes have only been designed to last for about sixty years, so that trees which take this long to reach maturity may be unsuitable.  

It must be realized that many schemes will take about three to five years to reach fruition. If you and your family will not be staying in one place for even this period of time, you should be thinking of ways to produce an instant garden. You could lay turves with bright summer bedding plants, and that way the plot will be at its best when you seek to sell the house.