I am not rich or posh. Has anyone normal used a garden designer?

[Kumbyar]

we have a very average 3 bed semi and want to make our garden more child friendly. our whole street is built into the side of a hill and so all the gardens are slopey. our back garden currently slopes up and away from the house and we share a boundary with our neighbours behind.

we want to terrace our garden but are scared that if we get your "average gardening man" in the neighbours garden behind might fall down into ours without substantial retaining walls.

we have been told about a garden designer who, for £400, will design and price up the work needed. but is this a gross waste of money?

me and dh are so cack handed at anything practical is it untrue!

advice or experience please!

some friends had their backyard done (not good at sizes, but it's your normal suburban backyard size). the have borders raised, a fountain in the corner, some lights, a deck and lawn. it cost £6k ! my DH and I did ours, filled in pond, small deck, ripped out and replaced ALL the plants, got rid of a playhouse, put down xtra slabs and herbs, put in a small fountain, and did some re-turfing for about £1500 (our garden is smaller than theirs) so if you can do any of the work yourself, especially sourcing of plants and planting you'll save yourself quite a bit.

maybe you could get the plans, see how much it would cost to do the terrace/retaining walls professionally, then do the rest yourself?

We got the front area of our house done. Cant remember the cost, kind of added it to the amount we were spending at the time on re-wiring, extension etc.
However, 5 years later it still looks great. He did us some steps around the side of our house, and loads of planting. I hardly have to do a thing!!
money well spent, if you are like me and dont know a weed from a flower.

thanks all, i think it is the "vision" bit that we need help with to start with..! our garden is about 45ft x 30 ft, so not big but the slope is very off-putting. i can't get my head around how many levels we will need etc.

and i am even considering astro-turf rather than grass as the dog and cat have ruined our current lawn!

(can you tell i do not have green-fingers??)

Yes , we have , They designed a small area at the bottom of garden which was just a pile of dirt. The plans themselves are that expensive ( in relation to the cost of doing it ).

You could enquire about how much plans would cost and then do it yourself or get quotes from builder etc .

Garden designers will also do planting schemes which will cost extra.

Sorry , should say 'the plans themselves ARE NOT expensive '

It does seem expensive, but if you use a good one they can come up with all sorts of ideas & solutions that you'd never think of. We used a company for our back garden which is a really awkward shape (we put in fake grass - best thing we did tbh) & it looks fab. Our front garden needed re-paving & tickling-up & we used one guy who worked for himself. Again, I do not regret it at all. Try to get someone who's recommended though (the first company had done our neighbour's garden) as I wasted a lot of money on some really crap people initially.
HTH.

"tickling up" ???

Sorry, should have added that they did all the manual labour too (I've done the planting). It's sounds like you'd need a lot of hard landscaping & they get in mini JCBs & skips & everything, which, frankly, would be a right PITA to organise yourself if you don't have the skills or experience.

tickling-up. Our front garden is overshadowed by trees in the street & it was a right mess as not much will grow there, so I wanted half of it cleared & bark chippings put down so I could put the DSs climbing frame there. The designer just helped me make decisions about how best to do that.

i think 400 for structural plans and planting plan is not terrible - if it is 2-3 days work?

you could get quotes from others to compare

or do what i did and go to the library and get loads of ideas from there

how mini are "mini jcbs"? we do not have good access to the back garden, only through the garage with a regular sized house-door opening at the back, iykwim.

We had our garden done this year. Expensive but SO worth it!!
The people we had broke everything down into sections so that we could see where all the money was going and leave bits out if we wanted.

the £400 is just for drawn up plans is it not? not for any actual physical work done? or am i being a numpty?

I agree with loujay. Both lots of people we used broke everything down into cost sections. I imagine the 400 would just be for the design & drawn-up plans, but that's quite reasonable. I'd prepare yourself for a big gulp when they do the estimate though!
We have access from the street to our back garden (one of the reasons why it's an awkward shape) - I don't know how they do it otherwise.

how big a gulp, scamp??

Well, to paraphrase the immortal Danny Kaye in White Christmas, somewhere between 'Yikes!' and 'Ouch!'.

& you have to perfect the art of looking completely unconcerned when they give you this information, & to give the impression that you are only changing the original spec for aesthetic reasons, not because you're a cheapskate, oh no...

lol!

Oh! You think I'm joking!
Let me know how you get on - the company I used for the back garden ( not cheap, but very reliable) are based in Essex - I'm in London & I can recommend them.

sadly we couldn't use that company, we are in scotland!

we have arranged for a man to come round next wk and give us an idea of what would be involved, just to get a ball park figure and then we will shop around i think, and try to get a recommendation.

wish us luck!