AIBU to want help creating a more established garden?

[Bedroomdilemmas113]

New build house. Not a huge garden but certainly not small, and a reasonably sized front too.

The problem is, I love old gardens. Not shiny grey porcelain and astroturf (neither of which I have, by the way, but every landscaper who has come to quote insists this is what I ‘need’ to be in keeping with the house(.

Any experience of gardeners, would I be better to have one? I’m struggling with long term vision - I want to plant shrubs and perennials but I want them to be large now. If I keep going, I may have a forest if I don’t get some outside knowledge…

Is this something a gardener could/would take on? Not just cutting the grass but actually helping with what to buy/plant etc?

Post on the gardening board! We LOVE plants and gardens over there and you'll get lots of advice! 🌿🌳
www.mumsnet.com/talk/gardening

You can buy bigger established plants. They just cost more.

There are a few accounts on Instagram around creating lovely gardens in new builds. I can't remember the names off the top of my head but if you search I'm sure you will find some.

Thank you!
The problem is that I don’t actually have the knowledge, time or desire to create or tend to this imaginary garden, I just want to look at it!

I did this for one side of the garden - the issue is knowing how much bigger they’ll still grow if that makes sense.

Wait til later in the year and look for bare roots plants. They're usually larger and cheap and easy to transport and plant.

I have a large garden which was all grass, I've put in huge beds by buying bare roots and plants from the 'reduced because it's finished flowering' section at the garden centre. Obviously it still took a few years to fill out but not too bad.

You could also post on Facebook asking if anyone is selling any large, mature plants. I have 2 7' shrubby things in pots I want rid of and a huge hydranger and pampus grass that are in the wrong place and will be a nightmare to dig up, I'd happily give them away if someone did the work.

This is my issue - ‘only a few years’, which I absolutely know isn’t long in the gardening world, makes me want to scream. I want everything to look like it’s been established for 5 decades, tomorrow 🤣

You could look at getting a local garden designer in. We paid around £700 for a local guy to come round and measure up and create a few plans that suited the size and style that we wanted. He gave us planting lists and locations so we sourced and planted all the plants / trees / bushes ourselves.
We also got a landscaper to do patios and build some planters etc.

We also had the option to just let the garden designer guy manage the whole build which would have been many weeks quicker than we were able to do it, but obviously was a good bit more expensive.

This sounds like exactly what I need! Is that what you actually searched for (garden designer)?

I have patios, gazebo and planters built, I just want them full and glorious and established and this is my current obsession….

Yes just 'garden design + closest town' on google and looked through the options that came up. The one we ended up going with was actually based in our little village but i had never heard of his business before.

It takes a bit of filtering to weed out (pun intended) the 'grey slabs and astroturf' type 'designers' but there should be plenty of plant-y type people as well!

Amazing, thank you!!

Look at the Charlotte Hugh’s new.house.home account on Insta. What she has done to her new build garden is amazing.

Create the structure of a garden with larger elements - shrubs, furniture, very large pots, trees, bird table or pond etc.

Place them, with the direction of the sun in mind. e.g. if you spend more time in the garden in the afternoon/evening, place the chairs to face west etc.

Once you have those in place, you can fill in with bulbs, bedding, bird boxes and smaller stuff.

I started with two fig trees in huge pots and a table & chairs, and built around that.

In garden centres bushes usually have a label on which states the height and width when fully grown and how long it takes to get to fully grown, use this info when planting and leave enough space around each bush for growth. If you buy online as I do then this info is always included in the written descriptions.

I have still made mistakes though but it’s not too hard to dig up a bush after one or two years before it’s fully rooted and move it elsewhere. Or if one is getting too big for the space, keep it pruned back to the size you want. I do this with a buddleia as it’s a bit of a thug and can take over a garden, I prune it back to the ground late autumn then trim back any long branches through the year.

Buddleia sounds like it might be what I am after! I want my garden to be taken over…

thanks!

Just googled - it’s exactly what I’m after! Does it still take up plenty of space when it isn’t flowering?

It either takes time and effort OR money 😁

my garden was cleverly planted by the previous owner so I changed almost nothing

every month a perennial come up, so there is always something in bloom with bare patches filled in with wild flowers (forgetmenots are one of my favourites for shade, lavender mist and self seeding snapdragons for sun)

just get started and build it bit by bit

go to the garden centre once a month and get a blooming perennial, plant it, then do a new one the month after. That way, next year, something will bloom any time of the year

My new build garden is only 7 seven years old and looks very established already. It's amazing how quickly things grow. I drew a basic sketch of border shapes, patios and pergola which a local landscaper did for me. I then went to a wholesale nursery and bought the bigger shrubs and trees I wanted plus two gorgeous wisterias for the pergola. The main thing I did was plant a hedge (with whips) all the way round as I couldn't bear to look at the fences. I'll look for a photo for you

Not shiny grey porcelain and astroturf (neither of which I have, by the way, but every landscaper who has come to quote insists this is what I ‘need’ to be in keeping with the house(.

No advice to offer, I am just shocked that a landscape gardener would suggest astroturf! Do you not give them an outline spec before they quote? Some indication of your likes and dislikes.

Follow Pollyanna Wilkinson on Instagram. She's a garden designer. £££ I'm sure to hire and I think she does bigger projects, but her content is really useful in terms of planning a garden, working out how to create structure etc.

It won’t give “instant huge plants,” but a scoop of Rootgrow in the hole before the plant goes in has really cut down the waiting for us. We planted a bed of lavender, salvias, and a few other things last August. I bought plants in small pots as that was cheapest. Used Rootgrow. It looked feeble at first, so much bare earth between them. Now I can’t see the earth at all, they have grown so much. I’m a bit astonished! But pleased.

Leaving our garden when we move at close to 30 years in a couple of years will be the hardest part. We have planted 4 trees.

Bamboo grows very quickly but is invasive, put some in pots for instant height.

My Mother had a small apple tree in a pot, I bought an acer a few years ago, it’s in a huge pot it’s about 8ft tall now. It only cost £12 when I bought it. To buy one that size now is about £200. I’m really glad I didn’t plant it. As mentioned you can even mature plants and even trees put in but they can cost thousands.

We have a big buddleia, was planted by previous owners, it also attracts butterflies, may be why it’s so popular.

You could also try some planters that tiered.

I would say nearly all shrubs grow big if you leave them long enough. Roses, not climbers, stay small if you prune them. Ground cover plants don’t get tall but they spread.
if you plant things under or beside trees they don’t grow very big as they are competing for moisture and nourishment.
Deutzia grows quickly - but mine is an old one I take cuttings from -sometimes the new ones in garden centres are ‘special’ and stay small
I spose you should get a designer but
it if you look online for a gardening book/guide eg RHS of what to plant where will give you a lot of ideas then, as the local garden centre won’t have the interesting things you’ve decided on do a search online and order from whatever nursery in the country has it
sorry it’s a bit long
adding - it’s nice to see your own choice of plants maturing rather than what the designer chose

We don't have a new build as such, but we renovated what had been a completely derelict house. The garden was overgrown with 20yrs of untouched growth. Unfortunately there was very little garden we could salvage amongst the sheets of asbestos, bags of rubbish and tyres!

On issue many friends have had with new builds is that all manner of rubble gets left around they bring in a thin layer of soil and off they go. Have you dug down to see how deep the soil goes?

DH and I also have no idea about shrub/border specifics. A friend owns a nursery which specialise is trees and shrubs of all sizes. He has completed multiple horticultural degrees/courses etc. One thing he advised is that ever 2nd person will say they are a 'garden designer' but what actual skills and experience do they have. Do they know how large that plant will grow, the maintenance, position etc? In a previous property, we employed someone but it was clear that she had no idea how to prune and care for certain plants- and wasn't bothered to find out. IF you go down that route get recommendations and read reviews.

Gardeners corner is a free forum which helps me- mainly for veg growing but they have a design sections, tree section, pond plants etc. You might be able to upload some pics and get ideas from there too.
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