To ask you for ideas what to do with my garden?

[labyrinth]

We have a house that sits on half an acre. We're extending the house as it's tiny but the garden is massive. We're sick of spending 3+ hours every week cutting the grass so are looking to use about 1/4 of an acre as something alternative. There's currently a gravel track down the of the plot which allows vehicular access and also a large pole barn. The area is fenced off on all sides so can be separated from the rest of the garden.
DP is keen on using the area for a large pond and using the barn for a hot tub, outdoor bar, etc. But it makes the track obsolete.
Any ideas?

Any chance of a photo so we can see the possibilities more clearly?

I was wondering if you could dig the area out and cover it completely with decorative gravel, split into maybe 4 sections and edged with decorative pavers or even sleepers? You could have a couple of raised beds or pools on this if you wanted, or maybe have a pergola over part of it with a sitting area?

Here's an image from Google. Hope this helps. Have no clue what to do with it and hoping to make it a bit more of a feature as at the moment it may as well be waste land!

I see what you mean about the size!!

Personally I'd even up the shape of the area and definitely go for some kind of partitioned hard surface with a large seating area - possibly north of the tree if the top of the image is indeed north? That would mean you'd sit facing west and it looks as if there'd be a view towards fields (?) which could be attractive

You'd need to separate it visually from the drive of course - maybe a low stone wall on the long section with something higher for any area you need to hide? And if you wanted to keep some of the green you could always have a planting bed down the long side, with evergreen, low maintenance shrubs

Either that or buy a ride on mower

BTW if the hard surface idea worked for you there are some great ideas / inspiration here:

www.pinterest.co.uk/outdoorlife/garden-surfaces/?autologin=true

You could divide the garden up into sections, using trees and hedging to make the divisions, then treat each section as a different "room". One section could have seating/BBQ/hot tub, another smaller area by the house to sit out with a cuppa in the mornings, have a vegetable garden, a herb garden, a cut flower garden, etc.

There are lots of garden design ideas on Pintrest and Instagram, and sites such as the RHS will have info on plants.

Start watching Gardener's World (usually on Fridays) on BBC2, the presenter, Monty Don, has a large garden divided up into different areas, and when he moved in, it was just a field. You'll be able to get some ideas from watching GW.

If you don't like gardening, or mowing, why buy a house on half an acre?

Anyway - you could buy another mower and mow for 1.5 hours each, every week.

Or grow some veg, I'd love that amount of land.

Has it previously been used for equestrian purposes?

Use the grass to fatten geese and do a deal with a local butcher at Christmas.

Robot lawnmower?

Convert some of the lawn into an orchard. Plant umpteen different kinds of fruit trees. I'll leave it to someone with more gardening knowledge to suggest what to do with the ground beneath the trees, that won't require mowing.

You can just keep a small lawn by the house and then convert the rest of the grass to meadow which only needs mowing once a year. As PP said plant a few fruit tress and say its an orchard.

If the barn is the building at the bottom of the pic I wouldn't walk all the way from the house to sit in a hot tub there, I'd want the tub by the house.

From the aerial pic I think the gravel drive kind of ruins the garden and makes it narrow. Maybe its not so obvious on the ground. Prob expensive to revert gravel to grass though.?

Build a proper walled garden.

I'd create a meadow.

As pp said, they only requires mowing once a year. Easy. And fabulous for wildlife.

I'd also plant apple trees around the edge so it was a sort of orchard/meadow.

You'd have an initial outlay to do it properly and get it professionally seeded.

My thoughts were use back part as a paddock for a pony, or maybe build a whacking great pond with low maintenence wild flowers and trees around it. I like the idea of a meadow/orchard.
I wouldn't want to walk all the way down there to a hot tub to be honest. We store logs in the barn at the moment and in the winter it feels like a long trek to get a barrow full!
I think whatever we do we'll probably have to get rid of the track down there. Unless it's still needed it just seems pointless.
We moved from a small 3 bed semi with a small garden and had no idea how much time the grass would take up. As it stands we use a ride on and a push mower and it still takes 3 hours a week to do properly!

You could get a couple of pet sheep to keep the grass down! But not goats. Goats will eat everything except the grass! My in laws made that mistake once, when they borrowed a neighbours goat to "cut" the grass in their orchard!

NATURAL SWIMMING POOL. I had to shout as it's the only possible thing worth doing in that space.

I have one and omg it is brilliant. We built it ourselves last summer. Bliss.

Here's a pic

Wildflower meadow
Orchard
Wildlife pond
Mixed hedge
Flower borders
Stream
A chicken coop and run.
Moss, clover, thyme or chamomile can be lawns instead of grass.

It will take several years but all gardens tend to evolve.

I'm very jealous @buckingfrolicks! It must be wonderful in this weather, to be able to cool off in that.

There's not enough room for a pony. Horses and ponies need to be kept together, they are need animals. You would also need to rotate the grazing ie couldn't be on the same bit all year. So, a pony is a bad idea.