To wonder why this is 'common'?

[Ellbee83]

I live in an end-terrace house, with a small front yard/garden which I've made as nice as I can with plants, garden furniture, a few fairy lights.
It's south-facing so for (literally!) a few months of the year when the weather allows, if I'm at home and not busy, it's lovely to sit out in the morning with a coffee, or in the evening with a book & glass of wine.
It's genuinely one of my simple pleasures, it's nice to watch the world go by, smile at passers-by, idly chat with the neighbours if they're around but mostly 100% minding my own business and enjoying my own outdoor space.

Yesterday evening, my neighbour (72f) from 3 doors down went past, walking her dogs. She stopped to chat as we often do - the weather, how the flowers are doing, that sort of thing, nothing major! She then went on to tell me how she wouldn't dream of sitting out in her front garden as she'd been taught it was 'common'. I laughed in surprise and said 'Oh, am I being common?' to which she laughingly agreed I was!

Now, tbh, I found it waaaay more common that she'd be so rude but I'm curious - is sitting out in the sun, in your own front garden seen as 'common'?
Not too bothered either way and I'll carry on doing it but I've restricted myself to the back garden today 🫤

Interested to hear opinions!

Common or European.

We had a beautiful large front garden, but wouldn't dream of sitting out there, its nicer than our back garden, so its a shame. Its the lack of privacy for me.

The Americans love their front porches and many also have sizeable decks to sit in their back yards. We don't use the word "common". The type of people whose yards are eyesores (full of rubbish , junked vehicles etc) are known as " Rednecks".lol

Well, she’s not inventing the idea that sitting in your front garden is ‘common’ , if that’s what you’re asking. Fairly widespread view/prejudice, regardless of whether or not you think it’s ridiculous. I think it’s in Kate Fox’s Watching the English.

It is only common if you are sitting on a knackered sofa, drinking Bucky wine and smoking a fag… with curlers in your hair.

Yes I have been taught it’s “common” too but I don’t think you’re unreasonable for doing it!

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻😂

What about those of us who live on corners?
We don’t have proper back gardens.

We get sun in our front garden in the evenings. We put a seat out there and it's lovely. But passers-by do regularly look surprised. It's our space and we will use it

More people round are way are now placing a bench in their front garden, particularly if their back garden happens to be north facing.

We'd lived in our house for 20 years, cutting the grass and planting the flowers in the front garden, and never once sat in it or even spent time out there, literally walking through it to get to the front door. During covid we realised what a lovely sunny space it is in the morning when the back garden was in shade and started to have our breakfast in the sun before working from home. It was glorious! What a wasted space!

There is a row of big houses overlooking the lake where I live and lots of the residents there sit out in their front gardens I presume because they are South facing and have a nice view. The houses are amongst the most expensive in my town. I very much doubt people would describe those residents as 'common'.

I don't get this, why wouldn't you have a back garden on a corner plot? My parents lived on the corner. Detached house, lovely front & back gardens.

Depends if your family is pic 1, or pic 2.

Are you the 'sit down with a book on a bench under the lounge window, or on the front lawn' type? Or the 'big inflatable and trampoline and barbecue (with 48 cans of Woodpecker Cider) on the front lawn' type?

One is 'common' and one is not. I'll leave you to guess which is which.

I'm in Melbourne and use my front garden all the time. Having said that, it's entirely private from the road and NDNs. Long ago I read that only "Poms and reffos" sit in their front gardens and I must say on my street, only me and my also forrin NDN use ours. For context, it's a staid, affluent suburb.

There's still a contradiction at the heart of Aussie attitudes as it's entirely OK to have a sofa on your street-facing verandah.

I have verandah envy. 🛋️

I imagine @poetryandwine maybe lives in a newbuild? (post 2005.) They usually have small back gardens, and the end one/corner one sometimes tapers in so it's a bit poky. Then again, the front gardens are usually not huge either!

Carry on as you are and enjoy your garden. Who cares what others think. Life is too short!

I've always had a yen for a wrap around porch I could sit on as they do in parts of the USA. I'd sit on a porch swing or in a rocking chair quite happily.

It varies.

I do have a large back garden, but the terraced houses at 90 degrees to my house and garden have front doors and front gardens which look onto my front and back gardens. (My house is an end-terraced house.)

I did have a 6 ft hedge at one point, but the council took it upon themselves to butcher the back garden hedge at one point, thereby making my garden visible to the general public - there's a path to a park running between my back garden and the neighbours' front garden. (They didn't touch the front garden hedge.)

I've been trying to retrain the back garden hedge in order to regain some privacy and have succeeded in improving things to an extent.

I can remember being silently horrified when a work colleague told me that all the families in his cul de sac sat in their front gardens.
They had large sunny back gardens too.
They were just a sociable bunch.
And I say this as a parent who had to stand in our road for years ( another cul de sac) while our small children played out.
These days, I don’t think I care.

I don't think it's 'common'. I think it's just a bit odd.

Well owing to the orientation of our house on the plot, we have a lovely front garden and a a really superb side garden. This is typical of many corner houses. Your parents are lucky.

PS we have a high hedge in the front so it is quite private, overly so IMO

I’m late fifties and she was just being friendly, telling you how she remembers her childhood, but she sees that of course now things are different.

My late mum (born 1926) would never have sat in the front garden (common), or eaten anything standing up in the street (common) - and we lived on a rural Yorkshire council estate. She scrubbed our front step every day and the net curtains were always sparkling white, lest the neighbours thought she was a ‘slattern’.

I still don’t hang out in my front garden or eat standing up but I never think about why, I just don’t do it. I don’t care if others do because now its 2026 and standards of respectability like these are not important now.

I’d always understood it’s ’common!’ I do it in my garden too though, and I genuinely enjoy it. It feels quite American to me, like an old lady on her rocking chair on the front porch.