Gardens with nothing in them?

[BigDahliaFan]

Would you not at least put a low maintenance shrub in? I mean not everyone wants full on Monty Don....but something?

The thing is that the collapse in biodiversity & flooding risk is everone's business & will cost everyone in increased taxes to reverse the damage.

I think you've got exactly the right idea though - if you hate gardens live in a flat without a garden. That is the ideal. Leave gardens to those of us that will care for them.

Yes! Any garden that encourages pollinators & wildlife is brilliant. I'd much rather people left their gardens to go wild than stick poisonous plastic over them.

Because it's a site mainly for women
That doesn't mean our discussions are limited to things only women can do.

After 20+ years of having basically a football pitch as a garden with no flowers due to 4DSs nd their love of cricket and football, I finally thought I need somewhere lovely to sit and read with some lovely colourful flowers to look at. So I splashed out on some pots and loads of bedding plants etc to dot round my (what poses as a) patio. I was so pleased with it🙂 but I forgot that next doors toddlers are now 6/7/8 yrs old and have found a love of football and sure enough, within the space of an hour their ball came over twice and landed on my beautiful plants😡. I am destined never to have pretty flowers……

We used to have football-mad boys playing on their drive next to my garden... I don't remember anything ever being damaged by the many balls that came over. Tbf many sailed over the border onto the lawn. They were very polite about asking for their balls back and gave me a tin of chocolate or biscuits each Xmas to thank me for lobbing them back over.

TBF I think the dads kicked it over so it came over with more velocity than a child’s kick - definitely knocked the flowers off the one it landed in!

@SuperBored this is not at all how I've read this thread. For me it's been lovely to see just how many people take pleasure in their garden and celebrate the beauty and richness it bring to their lives.. its quite inspiring...

I was brought up with beautiful gardens at home, at my grandparents house. My mum even made a tropical garden on the large balcony when we lived abroad. It was heaven to sit out in the heat surrounded by orchids of all different colours.

When I was in my 20s, we bought our first house from my dad so I inherited a lovely garden which was small and manageable. I still gardened with a baby, job and commute.

We then bought a bigger family house which has a really big garden. South West facing. At first it was an absolute swamp. Nothing other than mud. A couple of years ago we had the money to install a pergola, new fence and some raised beds.

It's not at all polished, it has a large lawn as the kids still play out on it. But I'm always planting things. I have lots of pots full of perennials. Not many seem to have flowered yet though. We have bifold doors and I can see the birds, hedgehogs and other wildlife on the lawn which is lovely.

When we have people over, we sit in the pergola with flowering clematis and honeysuckle surrounding us and I feel proud.

I hate going to my friend's garden. As much as I love her, her garden is so sad. Just decking and fake grass. Much tidier than mine but no life whatsoever.

The previous poster who hates gardens: I agree that that’s fine if you go and live in The Barbican.

As I said, my neighbours chose to move to a leafy suburban area and then tarmac/Astroturf every square inch of their garden. They are also constantly making planning applications to fell a protected oak tree. Those pesky trees - the darn things have leaves

I think gardeners world and the like make it all look harder than it is, I love watching while they show a beautiful garden or remind me to prune my wisteria, but I think there needs to be something more beginner level showing you average UK garden with new build soil and just where to start….

If they've tarmacked it all or used a lot of other impermeable surfacing they may have contravened planning regulations

www.gov.uk/government/publications/permeable-surfacing-of-front-gardens-guidance/guidance-on-the-permeable-surfacing-of-front-gardens

I'm curious... the docs I can find are all about front gardens (where there may be a good reason for wanting hardstanding). I can't see anything about back gardens ... surely there should be similar consideration for not putting in excessive amounts of impermeable surface?

It is such a shame. It also seems the trend now that when folk buy a house they strip out all the hedges/ mature trees etc and put in the same fences/ raised beds with lights/ outdoor kitchen but actually very little plants. And then they complain that the garden floods in winter…..
gardening doesn’t have to be high maintenance- we have a survive or die motto in my garden and it’s full of hedges and trees. It makes such a difference in the heat of summer, the suck up all the water from the clay soil and we have so much wildlife. And it’s so much cheaper and easier to maintain than built infrastructure…

There is a massive need for this - the huge gardens whilst beautiful aren’t relatable to most. But I love gardens world - especially Monty’s dogs!!
you should pitch your idea to a TV station - ‘my new build garden’ - have it from folk getting the keys, various different soil types/ size/ aspect and what you can do with it. A bit of wildlife gardening. How to maintain fences/ sheds/ intro DIY - it would be great! 👍🏻

I'm sure as soon as we sell that our front garden will be ripped out for parking...even though we have a drive that can fit 3 cars in line and can park right outside our house with no bother at all any time.

Anyway beginners gardening on TV a bit like Delia's How to Cook....

We live in a new build and have always preferred to have aritificial grass (i know the horror). It suited our lifestyle with young children and limited space. Then it suited when we had a bigger garden and dogs and spent time with older kids playing football and badminton in the garden.

What we have now though is lots and lots of plants, trees, pots, strawberries, herbs etc all over the place taking a little bit of the edge off everything. I even have pots full of beebombs dotted around.

The main benefit other than everything being so clean is that it takes us 1 day to get it ready after the winter and then its just a case of adding to it or maintaining what we already have. In todays hectic society this is how we like to be.

I have artificial grass...even if I had real grass, I have nowhere to store a lawn mower. My garden is small and I don't want to install a shed and take up even more room

I know a front garden which was all gravel but low, creeping plants were put in and they gradually filled the whole space. The words stonecrop and creeping thyme come to mind. If necessary, a car could easily be pulled on to it, but it didn't stop green things from happening.

I hate gardens; I have horrid hayfever that reacts to everything so being in a garden is often painful for me. I pay a bloke to mow the huge swathes of grass, keep the hedges in check, and try to stop the conifers taking over the world. There is a healthy bird population in my garden due to the trees, and we get a lot of bees because the lawns aren’t perfect, so support insects with daisies, buttercups, dandelions, and whatever else manages to take hold.

In a perfect world it would be a nice space, as it is, it’s serviceable, reasonably tidy, and fairly wildlife friendly. It won’t ever look pretty though, and I won’t apologise for that.

@FussyPud you don't need to apologise for that, you have a natural garden that suits your needs.

I dream of having a small garden with a patio and some lawn. I would possibly do a couple of seasonal pots. Just a bit of outside space that is mine.

I have no garden atm.

At least gravel or grass allows rainwater through and doesn't create run off. I have no idea why people would happily put down a green plastic carpet in their outside space that looks crap and is crap for the environment.

The PP with just a lawn and some hedges....that is fine! There'll still be some life underneath your lawn and it doesn't affect anyone else. That is not true for the plastic grass brigade unfortunately.

Artifical grass needs to be banned. I imagine it will be within a decade or two.

I concede it's crap for the environment but my artificial grass doesn't look crap...I've attempted for ten years to grow a decent lawn including paying for it to be professionally laid. Every time it's failed. Small, overlooked, north facing garden and dreadful clay soil. None of my neighbours have nice lawns either. If I look out of my window my garden looks much nicer than the neighbours with their patchy lawns.

Natural always look better. I know which one of these I'd rather see.

So the choices are gaudy plastic carpet or arid dirt? I'd still choose arid dirt.