Garden Makeover diary, Glasgow

I_have_spoken

As title, I'm doing a garden make over near Glasgow.

The front of the house faces north-east, so it's being kept basic and I'll focus my effort on the back garden which gets sun most of the day.

Anyhow, this is how it was last autumn.



The copper beech really had to go, it was going to get too big. A border's been created on the boundary and more plants have been added along the front of the house. I've used golden gravel along the front to reflect what light there is.

Cally_Smart

The front garden's looking very good already, it will be interesting to see how it develops in the future(& have a look at the back garden !),So many people rip up their front gardens to get the extra car parking space -which is a shame really)

aggypanthus

The pic doesnt show close up of the plants for people to comment on.
any of the back yet?

I_have_spoken

So, used the 'longest day' to add a new bed at the front. The 'golden' gravel turned out to be pretty white so a 'seaside' theme came about by accident...

The bed only gets morning and evening sun, so getting the light reflecting off the stones may be no bad thing.

Plants used are 3 ajuga, siberian iris, not sure - poss. almeria , three miscanthus panicum 'Heavy Metal' which are only just recovering from being divided and potted-up last year and finishing with another plant I can't recall name of...plus I've dotted about some house leeks.

The iris I picked-up at 50% discount as they're "over" for year, but the leaves should contrast with the miscanthus once it gets going. I really though dividing it had killed it off, but the roots are good so hopefully the foliage will get going now it's getting warmer at night.

Planting is sparse by design to see how the plants like the ajuga cover the gravel, plus I wanted to leave space for autumn bulbs such as dutch iris.

This being Glasgow, I've profiled the ground to raise the centre of the bed and each plant was left 2cm above the ground to allow a 'collar' of gravel to help reduce the chance of water logging and rotting off.





And this is the 'blank canvas' back garden, together with plants from my last place plus some new additions awaiting the makeover to start. BTW, due south is over the back fence on the left so the edge of the grass along the dwarf wall is in full sun all day. However, the soil quality is dreadful - pretty much solid clay so am expected to have to remove a layer, replace with top soil and rotovate.



The yellow marker shows the plan, which is a 1m border all around, where the wall is 'hatched', take that down to patio level and install wide steps up to the retained lawn using 600x600mm black limestone slabs. Each side of the steps will be 1.2m deep perennial beds. The brick wall will be repaired and cement render and likely painted black.

The steps will be broad enough to take the two big terracotta pots now sitting on the path around the front.

Well need new turf too, those are bull rushes growing, although I may leave that until the autumn rather than try and get new turf to take in the summer! The back fence will get shrubs in front and some climbers to cover.

If this was my 'forever' house, I'd be much more aggressive in reducing/removing the lawn but have half-an-eye on selling what is a family home so peeps'll likely want a lawn in an enclosed rear garden.

Thinking about the patio, which is very poor slabbing. I was going for a deck but have gone off that idea due to attracting rodents.

I_have_spoken

Finally...got started on the garden. Late in the season, but not too late I hope!

Turf being lifted, rented the machine and skip. Turf lifter so quick and easy(ish).



Turf cut as far as machine can do, leaving strip along fences. Whole 'lawn' needs replacing, it's awful (moss, weeds) but that can wait until next Spring now.



Very deep edging to help drainage. Marked out where steps will be. The plan is long, wide steps using slate - expensive but I've saved on labour.



Clay clods all in skip.



Hired a mini-tiller to break ground. Solid, heavy clay - took all day even with machine :mad: Spread pelleted chicken manure before tilling - assuming soil is totally depleted under the grass. Raked over to removed worst of stones.

Wall demolished and footings dug for new section of wall for steps. Whirly drier removed, but why, oh why, did they use 40cm of concrete to hold it? Will need to hire a breaker.



Yay! Finally planting can start Everything has been in pots all summer, except the twisted willow which has migrated to the wettest part of garden - hope it likes it. Got a 1 tonne bag of loam topsoil which is spread over the tilled clay and lightly dug in. I am effectively raising height of beds by 10cm - 20cm to improve drainage and hopefully get plants/bulbs through Scottish cold wet winter. Esp. trying to avoid 'sumps' around root balls, added blood, fish and bone to help roots establish and watered in.



Back in the front, something a wee bit exotic (for Glasgow). Cannas, but need to keep under awning as the flowers get knocked off in heavy rain...

Rummer

Wow you had done loads in such a short space of time and it is looking great already!

Leif

Good for you, a nice garden makes a house look much better.

Cally_Smart

You've done so much & so thoroughly.It's lovely to see it progress. You're certainly giving your plants every chance to succeed with all that preparation & additions to the soil ! Keep up the posts,it's like Ground force! Expecting to see Alan Titchmarsh pop up somewhere in the pictures!(as he's so prone to do on tv recently!....love him really !)

I_have_spoken

You're certainly giving your plants every chance to succeed with all that preparation

I hope so! I used to have a garden in one of the driest English Counties, so South Lanarkshire is a quite a challenge! The worst parts of the soil were obviously anaerobic with an 'off' smell and virtually no earth-worms.

I'll be putting grit under autumn planted bulbs in an attempt to stop them rotting off.

That said, I've planted up with some Scottish 'dependables' as well as plants which may be 50:50 in a hard winter.

I_have_spoken

An update from work done over the last week.

The focus has been on planting and the slab laying is only a mockup to check which are the best ones. The engineering bricks will be masonry painted in "stone" and have coping made from poorest slate slabs sawn into 4 strips, hiding all the holes.

The drainage problems on site have been causing some puzzlement. It looks like some field drains will need go in when new turf in laid on a bed of sand, so piping will be laid under the slabs in readiness.

General view now the shrubs and plants are in. There's room still for bulbs and ground cover, plus trailing plants to come over the dwarf walls. The steps are very wide so all the large pots have a home and I can take them with me - as I said, this isn't likely to be a 'forever' house.



North East facing, gets the morning light then in shadow of fence as sun moves around. That's a dogwood at the end and a heap of daffs from the pot waiting to be planted.



West facing, gets light from midday to sunset. There's a dwarf bamboo and a pyracantha on the white trellis. The cannas in pots need to be coming into the conservatory soon.



East facing, put in a trellis to give some height and planted clematis either side, still to tied on.



South facing, right side planted with perennials from daisy family (helenium etc), dahlias and a ceanothus in the corner. Not expecting the verbena bonariensis to cope with the Scottish winter, but will try.



South facing, left side, the strap leaves are peacock orchids.

I_have_spoken

Progress has been a bit slow Also there's been unseen work like planting bulbs and pricking out seedlings into the self-watering cells (bottom right).

Anyhow, finally(!) the 60cmx60cm slate slabs have been laid after endless faffing about getting the footings done, brickwork pointed and painted. I thought the masonry paint was more 'stone', it's really off-white.

However, here in Scotland a lighter colour may be welcome during the long, dark winter

Next job is to hire a cut-off saw and slice up the remaining slabs to make coping for the wall. I did look at buying cast concrete coping, but none appealed.

Obviously this shows up the awfulness of the patio and the "lawn". Grass will get turfed next spring, patio I'm still thinking about. A quick improvement may be to break up the 10cm line of concrete they put between the wall and the slabs and fill with 20mm slate chips.