Please show me your small terrace house garden

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If you have one! My garden is teeny tiny and all mud. Nothing on Pinterest looks like it and can’t find much inspirational applicable content.

Would love to see some real life examples please if anyone has a similar sized garden.

Do you have a pic? How small are we talking? I'll try and find one from last summer when I get a moment.

I paved mine and had lots of containers with different plants in so it wasn't bare and miserable. It worked very well.

This is mine

Oh I do like that doctor .That fencing is perfect - privacy but not claustraphobic .

Was coming on to say that a small garden could be stunning ,mirrors ,ace fencing like above .Was going to say pots but I see *doctor8has lots planted in the ground which is xxxxbetter .

Thank you. I think because the garden is so small 15feet by 22 feet it did not lend itself to a rectangle. Cutting the beds into the paving and adding 3 steps makes it seem like three separate gardens. It also softens the harsh effect of the paving. You can sit on each level and get a different feel. The garden is very hot and is overlooked, so I needed lots of airy trees for shade and privacy.

You can get the same effect with large pots, or trellis coming out a right angles from the fence.

Sorry for the late reply to this. Have a 8 week-old-velcro-baby who refuses to let me put her down and type things :)

Doctordonowt - your garden is gorgeous. Feeling more inspired already!

GingerKitCat - According to the estate agent listing our garden is… "Approx 25’ paved, lawn and flowerbeds".

^But there wasn't any flower beds, or lawn, because it seems like the old owners dug both up and took it with them!! So just assume that this is a mud bath…

This is a picture from the original house listing - so we've got this, and a long alley/side return leading to the kitchen. It's actually bigger than it looks in this picture as the ivy was so massive. I have a roof terrace too, but that's easy to beautify!

The back wall is like a sheer drop from the neighbour's garden, if that makes sense? We are on the bottom of a hill and our back neighbours are at the top. So our back wall is the size of a house, almost.

Things we've done so far…

The mass of ivy at the back has been cut away now, we've added a trellis fence, taken down the rotting shed on the right. Have also added four giant mirrors (old wardrobe doors) to the left next to the trellis fence and have added trellis against it with some climbing roses / jasmine to try and create a secret garden look and feel.

We've painted the back wall black and added glow in the dark stars (which don't work!).

Added a mosaic floor (which is actually quite crap…) to the old shed base to make a shaded seating area and put a vertical wall planter with pockets on the walls round it. No plants seem to grow in them because they need so much watering. Bit of a fail all round tbh.

I want to keep the awkwardly placed buddleia tree smack middle of the back.

Was going to paint all walls / fences bright colours and added trellis and climbers.

TBH, it all looks pretty crappy, everything I've done so far, I mean. I am a serial plant murderer and our damp clay soil doesn't seem to let anything grow.

Tried to grow a wildflower lawn - didn't work. Tried to grow a clover lawn - didn't work.

So any ideas welcome, really!

I would take a more recent picture, but we've got so much snow it wouldn't be any use. Serves me right for procrastinating!

Well that buddleia likes your soil! And holy shit so does that ivy! I would really like to see what it's like without that!

Not much practical help as I am rubbish at designing stuff (I'm in charge of weeding, slashing, exterminating slugs and planting mental things in mad places when Mr Design Maestro's back is turned) but don't be downhearted. You'll find stuff that works.

Wow I'd love to see some pictures of what you've achieved so far (incl. different angles) once the snow melts and we return to normality! Sounds like you've done tons already especially pregnant/ with a new baby

I can't believe the ex owners dug the turf and patio up

The mega wall certainly sounds like a challenge but possibly a good one. I'd be interested to see it painted black sans ivy, sounds good! The mirrors sound brilliant too, they always look good in small/ courtyard gardens.

Do you know which direction the garden faces? Do you get much sun or are you too overlooked? Might be worth having another little patio/gravelled area for sunny seating, even if it's just big enough for a bistro set.

Vertical planters are a favourite of mine. Maybe it will work better in a different location or with some tweaking to retain moisture. I'm guessing that corner is dry shade (I could be wrong). I'm sure we could come up with some alternative planting for the area which won't die on you.

I have several thuggish buddleia for screening purposes. I've thinned mine out and got rid of a lot of the lower bulk allowing me to underplant them with more interesting stuff. Is yours purple? I love the contrast of purple/ green against black
They still go crazy in the spring/summer and I've forever taking new whips off with my secateurs to keep them in line. You can be brutal, it will bounce back as soon as your back is turned.

I'm a fan of string lights in small gardens too, always makes them look inviting on warm evenings!

I'm thoroughly enjoying the garden bird threads on here at the moment so I'd also suggest a bird feeder or two up high away from any sneaky neighborhood cats (maybe wired to the buddleia!)

I'm jealous of your roof terrace!

Please think again about the mirrors as they are a death trap for birds. The birds won’t realise it is a mirror and fly into it ending up with a dead bird as they snap their necks.
If you must have mirrors put some stickers or something on it to deter birds from flying into it, maybe some butterflies or something else garden themed.
ww2.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/bird-and-wildlife-guides/ask-an-expert/previous/mirror.aspx

@Doctordonowt your garden is beautiful

This was mine in the beginning. The raised borders have more foliage in now. I like roses as they flower frequently and quite late. Over the past couple of years I've added more tubs and bulbs too to space out the flowering season.
I use ornamental stuff such as bunting and solar fairy lights too but they are not needed quite as much now the plants are more established.
I've added a couple of pics of it a but more established too.

MeMe, that is beautiful! So inspiring

I seem to really struggle with roses and clematis, I'll be looking for tips on here this year!

Here is ours. It was planted up in June and the borders have filled out. We wanted low maintenance, evergreen plants so I suppose it's a little bit 'municipal' in terms of planting style, but we love it.

Thank you Ginger. I am a complete novice and have killed off quite a few lovely plants inbetween my successes.
I refer to my mum an awful lot for advice and tips.

Lilyclover - I love your seating area. Your lawn looks immaculate too!

Lily and Meme, I now have garden envy! I think I'll introduce a few more curves into the lawn this year

Cantspell2 - sadly, we don’t get any birds in our garden, or any of the surrounding ones. Out of the strip of terrace gardens, ours is the only one that’s not just concrete, and we have four cats (and the neighbours all have cats) so there’s nothing to interest them in the gardens at the bottom of the hill. But I will do this as a precaution. The plan was to grow plants over the mirrors eventually so they won’t look like open spaces.

Mrsbert - that ivy was a nightmare to get rid of! It was even bigger than in that picture when we moved in, was about a foot dense, and was growing from the garden above ours but was so long it covered the ground in our garden.

Doctor, I remember admiring your garden just after it was landscaped on a previous thread. It’s still looking lovely (I was favouritethings) x

Ginger - I typed out a long reply to you but it has vanished. Agh!

We’ve been here two years and the first year was just experimenting and seeing what grew / clearing the garden. The last spring I planted loads of th8ngs - then unexpectedly fell pregnant with our Pfb and had terrible morning sickness for weeks, so the garden sort of imploded! Nasturtiums took over the lawn in a mass of vines and some climbing varieties even took over the buddleia. That and some building work totally destroyed the garden and we will need to start from scratch this year.

Garden is south facing but we are overlooked.