To ask how to make an ugly garden pretty

[Irina2817]

We live in a small terraced house and have a front garden only. It’s hard to describe so picture attached but is about 20sqm and is just old patio slabs at the moment!

Random repositioning of photos @MNHQ 😠

In an area like that we have put chunky raised beds at the sides.
You could do that at the frount too and attatch a fence and grow climbers up. I wd put long flowering perenials in the raised beds.
I am.suggesting this in case there is hard core / concrere underneath the slabs etc .. so the raised beds wd save a lot of digging amd removing if there is hard core underneath..
. We made patch of our yard area into a woodland type garden. We have large ferns ( eveegreen) and tree stumps for seats , a fire pit and to hide the ugly floor ,ornimental bark .

urgh. shed being painted

(sort out the capitals issue @MNHQ)

@PatioGarden what kind of tree is the purple one on the right?
(your garden is gorgeous)

@Trivester thank you, I love working on it. It’s a very established ceanothus. Can be a shrub or a small tree. Beautiful, scented blue / violet blossoms from April to June.

If you have green finger editing neighbours, then that's great. Use their garden's for inspiration of what grows well. Or even ask them about amy of their plants you particularly like (eg name, how well it grows, how easy it was to establish), you might even get offered a few cuttings!

How about a small pebble pool
my fish give me so much pleasure!

@JaceLancs that’s lovely. Did you create from scratch? I can’t see the fish in the photo but what kind do you have? I am looking for this exact thing!

Paint is your friend here.
Give a proper cleaning to the patio and decide on a nice colour scheme.

Outside mortar paint should work.
Large plastic pots can be painted and are inexpensive and easier to move.

Power wash or remove slabs; which would give you a blank slate.
I wanted rid of slabs to lay turf and posted onFB marketplace and a man came and lifted them and took for his own garden.
With the slabs away you could create a beautiful wee garden; grass, raised beds to surround it filled with flowers/veg etc

I would personally avoid too many pots and tubs, nothing looks more scruffy than your of mismatched pots (esp in winter when the plants have died back).
I would probably keep the patio but make raised beds around it, filled with a variety of flowering perennials and also some fruit. Rhubarb and blackcurrants would be top of my list, with maybe a small cherry or plum tree.
Those strings of solar light bulbs are nice too.

And then make sure you keep your plants watered, fed, pruned, weeded, etc. Pots can't manage with just rain. Mix watering retaining gel/granules or vermiculite with the compost; and eg Osmacote. Happy days! (When I'm googling about gardening or plants, I usually put UK at the beginning and the end of my search term. Not saying that there isn't a lot of good advice from other places. )

Plant some lavenders in your stones, they will fill out and cover them and make it look softer. The firefly solar lights are twinkly and pretty (£5 in Tesco last week, a bargain)

Move house

Paint the floor

Pebbles / stones

Fairy garden

Artificial grass

Pull up the slabs

Fairy lights

Chiminea

Hanging baskets

Little bench

Gnomes

Birdhouse

Water feature

You could stencil the patio! Pressure wash, put on base coat and then either spray or paint stencil on top. Look up patio stencling - looks amazing.

There’s a brilliant book called Truly Tiny Gardens - you can find a cheap 2nd hand copy on Amazon.
Loads of brilliant ideas/pictures.,,

Plants, plants and more plants. Research what way your garden is facing, for example, is it south facing? Plants will have labels saying, needs full sun, all day or is shade tolerant. I wouldn't spend 500. Try out a few plants, to see how they grow, in that location. They will need good compost and regular watering, depending on the plant. I think a box hedge along the wall would look good, you can buy small box plants to make it cost effective.

Firstly, be honest with yourself about how much time you want to spend maintaining your garden as this should guide the look you're going for. For instance, pots can be terribly time consuming with watering especially if you dont have a water source close by and painted fences look great freshly painted but can soon look dingy.

Which one is it, I looked it up on the EBay and there's two types?

Google “Courtyard Gardens” - lots of lovely ideas there😁

Replace the slate stones with lavender bushes which will make a gorgeous border for the paved area.