North-East Facing Garden Sunshine

helptips

Hi everyone,

I am helping my friend out, whom has found a perfect house for her family, however her husband isn't happy due to the garden facing North East.

Now I know that many recommend the garden to be South or South-West, but many also say that other than the direction of the house, it also depends on many factors such as surrounding buildings, trees and height of house.

I know this is a bit of a long shot, but in order to help them out, could you please take a look at the google map photos below and tell me if you think the house or any other building would over shadow the garden? Or does the garden seem long enough to at least get some sunshine to it?

Also how do you work out where the shadow will hit from google maps? Is there an app?

Thanks very much!

Ithaca

This site (SunCalc) lets you see the direction of the sun at different times of day and on different days. You'll still need to work out the impact of building height but it will at least show you the direction the sun will be in at different times of the year.

It's useful as it will show you the point at which it sets in midwinter when it's at its lowest, and will also let you see what it's like in the summer (which is when you're more likely to be outside in the evenings).

Can you post up a link to google maps?

kinger101

The photos answer the question. You can see the shadows. The sun rises in the east, and sets in the west. The back garden will be sunny in the morning and shady in the late afternoon and evening. The house shades the garden in the afternoon. The fences a bit at other times, but the extent will depend of the time of year. It looks around midday in the photos.

NB - The annotations of your photos contradict your statement that it faces north east.

helptips

Thanks Ithaca,

To be honest those screen-shots are from suncalc.net. But suncalc doesn't show you what the elevation of the sun will be in graphics, so although it shows me that in how far east-west it would travel, I don't know how high the sun would climb.

Some people have managed to calculate how far the buildings shadow would go just by look at the maps, so could I not do that? How?

helptips

kinger101 wrote: »

The photos answer the question. You can see the shadows. The sun rises in the east, and sets in the west. The back garden will be sunny in the morning and shady in the late afternoon and evening. The house shades the garden in the afternoon. The fences a bit at other times, but the extent will depend of the time of year. It looks around midday in the photos.

NB - The annotations of your photos contradict your statement that it faces north east.

My apologies kinger as I didn't see your post when I replied.

Sorry, I'm a bit slow here, but I didn't get the last bit of your post...how do you mean that my photos contradict my statement? My statement is that the back garden is N/E facing...am I wrong there?

deFoix

On suncalc look at the orange curve for a particular time of year. The centre of the circle represents the sun directly overhead. The edge of the circle represents the sun on the horizon. If the orange curve is halfway between the centre and the circumference it's at an angle of 45deg in the sky.

But honestly, how often is it sunny without cloud in the uk? In winter do you really care about the garden? How often would you really spend in the garden?

I'm not saying it's not important just have to think it though. I'm more concerned at getting evening sun at the front glaring into my TV ;-)

bouicca21

The patio area is likely to be in shade all day. The rest of the garden is likely to get sun in the early morning and become increasingly shady in the afternoon.

helptips

Thanks very much for your replies and help guys. It's much appreciated.

@ Boler1985 - I still don't get the elevation/angle thing on suncalc, but it doesn't matter as to be honest it's not going to give me an accurate measurement and as you said, most of the time the UK is cloudy and if we're lucky we get a few weeks of good sunshine and then back to cold.

@ Bouicca21 - So your saying the garden is big enough that the house should not shadow the whole garden? ...at least not quickly?


He's come to accept that there maybe be little sun in the garden, but he was asking me a question....is it possible to use mirrors to reflect sunlight onto the garden? If so, how?

Thanks again

Derboy

https://www.findmyshadow.com

I used this. You need approx building height etc but you can then see exactly what shadows will be cast at different times of the day at different times of the year.

retiredandskint

My back garden is NE. The sun shines nearest the house in the morning and slowly moves to the back of the garden. In the height of summer there is very !little sun by 7.00 PM. Spring and autumn it's usually around 5ish Can't say I've noticed problems with plants. We have seating on the patio, the side and back of the garden.

For me it's ideal as I'm not good in the sun so I've always got shade.

helptips

Thanks retiredandskint,

As asked previously is it possible to use mirrors to reflect the sunlight into the garden?