Perfect Garden Style Tips Whatever Your Gardening Style and Needs
Be inspired by our garden ideas for summer 2009 and find the perfect style that best suits your personality and lifestyle, be it a classic British garden to a chic urban space. Enjoy your best-ever summer with these six inspiring garden design ideas.
Classic British Garden You don’t have to be squire of the manor – this look works well in city and suburban plots, too. Just think tea on the lawn, bunting and a jug of Pimm’s…
Get the look with 5 key essentials: 1. A well-kept lawn – Keep grass short, trimmed and green. Re-seed it in the winter if it looks patchy and cover with a clear plastic sheet until the shoots start to show. 2. Weathered stone paths and patios – Use York stone for a traditional look and invest in stone troughs or saddle stones as eye-catching features or alternative seating. 3. Co-ordinated planting – Take a formal approach by restricting plants to just a couple of colours. White and purple is a classic mix, so go for perennial white roses and hydrangeas with bedding plants such as allysum. 4. Rustic furniture – Choose a traditional wrought-iron bench and a period-style table and chairs, plus striped deck-chairs. 5. Classic accessories – Floral linen and buntin, plus traditional children’s games are a quick way of adding to the classic British look.
Container Garden Go potty with planters in a garden full of containers great and small. From terracotta to steel, your container garden can be as formal, colourful or sleek as you like…
Get the look with 5 key essentials: 1. Eye-catching planters – These will be the core of your container garden. 2. Large pots – or plinths that raise smaller ones up – add structure and height to the scheme. Small pots – Fill these with flowers and place anywhere for instant colour and interest. Smaller pots can be colourfully glazed, galavised steel or wood – anything to suit your scheme. 3. Unusual containers – Don’t just go for pots – use old watering cans, boots, teapots, tins and wheelbarrows to add interest. 4. Pot-smart plants – Check which varieties grow well in pots – even climbing plants can be based in a large pot. 5. Instant greenery – Buy pots ready planted with small trees or shrubs for a quick touch of well-established green in your garden or patio.
Secret Garden Get lost in your own private paradise – even if it’s in the middle of the city – with a garden that’s a haze of lush green with hidden delights around every corner.
Get the look with 5 key elements: 1. Twisting paths – Create sections in your garden with a winding path made from stepping stones, railway sleepers or bark chips. 2. Hidden focal points – The nooks of the pathway are the places to put statues, water features or dramatically coloured flowers. 3. Private place – Go for a table and chairs nestled into a shady corner, create a decked area surrounded by plants, or string a hammock up as the ultimate summer snoozing spot. 4. Oversized plants – Use large plants with frond-like leaves that will overhang pathways and obscure the view. It’ll keep visitors guessing what’s around the next turn. 5. Decorative pieces – We decorate our houses, so why not our gardens? Add a bit of eye-catching interest with glass baubles hung from trees, mini-lanterns strung along branches or a mirror to reflect the garden around it.
Cooks Garden
Want to eat organic food, but not pay the high prices? Grow your own in your garden designed to keep your table groaning with delicious food all through the summer…
Get the look with 5 key elements: 1. Raised beds – Originally designed as being better for drainage, raised beds are practical as they make weeding and tending easier, especially if you suffer from back pain. 2. Orderly rows – Make weeding easier by planting in rows. It’ll make remembering what you’ve sown – and where – easier too! 3. Sight screen – Beans and peas are a pretty way of screening off more unsightly areas of the garden, such as bins and a compost heap – they climb up trellises and have ornamental flowers. 4. Herb gardens – Native herb varieties, such as mint, chives and rosemary will flourish almost anywhere, but Mediterranean ones, such as basil, prefer well-drained pots that can be moved to follow the sun. 5. Garden helpers – Introduce useful insects and animals into your patch with toad houses (toads eat slugs and snails), ladybird hotels (ladybirds eat aphids) and bamboo bee nests (bees are essential for pollination.
Urban Living Garden
Take life outside this summer and create a slick outdoor room – perfect for super-stylish days and nights of entertaining or chilling out with friends…
Get the look with 5 key essentials: 1. Dual-purpose deck – Use it as your garden and your living room. This could be an extended patio space – decked or paved – but the overall look should be sleek and simple. 2. Smart containers – Plants should be structural and grown in pots or sunken beds. Try using gabions- metal cages – that can be filled with anything from pebbles to bottles. 3. Chunky furniture – Creating the living space means having comfortable, yet chic, all-weather furniture. Large metal or rattan chairs and day beds with upholstered pads will give you the luxurious look you need. 4. Outdoor gadgets – Think touch-button lighting schemes, professional gas barbecues, weatherproof TVs and hidden speakers. 5. Night lights – Keep garden parties going into the night with lights that show off features and plants while creating ambient light. Use lanterns and tealights, too.
Global Garden
Be in your garden… or by the sea in LA… or near the kasbah in Morocco… or relaxing in the south of France… with a scheme inspired by your favourite holiday spot…
Get the look with 5 key essentials: 1. Bright planting – Buy exotic blooms for your borders, or paint containers and plant pots in striking colours, so you’ll still have colour even after the flowers are gone. 2. Shady places – Stretch a sheet of fabulously coloured fabric over a seating area, or invest in a sun sail or arbour so you can stay in the shade while still keeping it bright. 3. Lit-up lanterns – The key to having Mediterranean-style nights is to light up the garden or an arbour like a trattoria – with as many tealight holders and lanterns as possible. 4. Colourful accessories – Buy bright plastic glasses for summer drinks, hot-pink and lime green cushions for relaxing on and tealight lanterns for some instant holiday style. 5. Sunny souvenirs – Put your personality into your garden with souvenirs you’ve picked up on your travels. There’s no reason why exotic tiles, hand-blown glass and ceramic bowls should only be kept in the house.
