Any ideas what to do with this grassy slope?

[tawnee]

Just moved house and have a small scruffy slope in my back garden which is just covered in grass and weeds. I did get a landscaper out to quote for some terraced beds and it was £2.8k so I'm wondering about cheaper solutions! Are there any plants / shrubs or similar which might be good for it if I kept it as a slope, or does anyone have any other bright ideas? Pics attached - I am not a keen gardener for context so have no clue and am looking for solutions which are pretty low maintenance / idiot proof. Thanks!

This mainly to bump!

I’d remove the grass (which is going to be a pain to cut) and carpet it with low growing plants that like well drained soil. I’m thinking things like aubretia, thyme, prostate rosemary etc.

Or a rockery if you can source the rocks at a decent price.

Or prostate conifers.

Whatever you do, plant densely to reduce the need for weeding

Take out the raised be at the bottom and make that grass.

If you have kids under 10, get a plastic slide and position it so they can slide down onto the grass at the bottom.

Cover the rest of the slope in herbs - salvia and rosemary and thyme. Also vinca is an easy ground cover plant.

Like this

If you’re not a keen gardener then I echo take out that raised bed, and I would just leave it all as grass. Mowing is much less faff than weeding and looking after plants that may not all be happy there. Get a nice light rechargable battery operated mower, and I echo get a slide (facebook marketplace) for the kids for that slope. Just start mowing it regularly - treat it like hoovering.

I'd cover the grass with black plastic or old carpet instead of digging it up, the roots are holding the soil in place. Then after its dead, plant it with creeping thyme. Its much cheaper than other prostrate plants, you can start growing it from seed now so its ready to go in. Its good for moths and pollinating insects.
I bought some as a living herb from the supermarket, split each pot into 4 clumps and grew them on - I was expecting bush thyme but its prostrate.

Shrubs, climbing rose on wall and or fence. Prob remove grass, plant shrubs, tallest by fence, graduating to low growing at front like small ? Hebes etc Spread wood chips or bark on the ground between them.

Thank you all! The slope isn't like lawn grass, it's more like the stuff that grows in fields and there's also lots of dandelions, cow parsley and other identified things that pop up there. So I do think I want rid of the grass as it still looks scruffy even when mowed (I did try).

If I cover the slope to kill the grass etc, do I then just put more soil on top of the dead stuff and plant as usual or do I need to pull out the dead grass first...

Clueless as you can tell but if I spent nearly 3 grand on terraced beds I would still need to not kill whatever I fill the beds with so would prefer to try some of your suggestions for planting on the slope first!

Weed out the stuff like dandelions and cow parsley. You don't need to dig out the dead grass, and the roots will hold the soil together while your new plants get established.
It is grass - just not a well tended lawn. The previous owners probably bought meadow turf.

Something like this?

Thank you. That laat photo is gorgeous and I feel far beyond my capabilities! I've never had a garden before (always renting until now) so hoping I can learn and come to enjoy it.

The dandelions and cow parsley will have seeded over the years so taking off the top layer of turf won't mean you are rid of these forever.
But dig out dandelions etc when they appear so they don't seed any more.

Or keep the grass and dandelions etc. Let it grow as a wild piece of lawn. No need to mow and will encourage wildlife in to the garden.

Lavender, and hydrangeas grow really well on slopes.
We have about 30m long worth of slopes all over our garden ( it’s literally built into hill in alps), and these two seem unkillable. They survive snow, rain storms, summer droughts or whatever else, and I’m a terrible gardener.
You could also add dwarf raspberries or dwarf blueberries for edibles.

Unkillable is key I would say! Thanks all.

Grass lawns aren't great environmentally - there's little to support insects and they're not really adding value to your garden either.

You could plant some mint varieties which love to spread and often flower so it gives some habit for bugs.

How much sun does it get ? I agree that the piece next to the rail on the steps would need attention too.

Some sort of waterfall water feature that could run downhill?

It's in the sun from around midday until sunset so the majority of the time. The smaller bit near the rail feels more manageable to me so less concerned what I fill it with but would be more of the same I imagine!

I'd deck it! Go straight out from the top. You could make it look nice from the front and give itself more space to enjoy the Sun. If need to get someone to do it. We just did similar for £3k so it's expensive but soo nice to use dove that was useless and terrible to look after!

If you want cheap options, and easy plants then ground covering plants like snow in summer, thyme, aubrietia, dianthus, even cotoneaster much as I think it’s a boring plant but it’s very low maintainance , has berries in the winter, tiny flowers in spring I think, lives on nothing. But whatever you have you’ll have to just keep things in check about twice a year.

Gardening on a slope can be tricky.
Lovely ideas on what is ‘low maintenance’ and various planting schemes pop up….

My experience is that although these sound great, the reality after a couple of years is anything that replaces the lawn will eventually require more work to keep it maintained. Weeding by hand on a slope covered in gravel/ soil/ wood chippings with groundcover plants is a thankless and endless chore.

So what to do…
At the moment, the lawn dominates the garden, and as it’s in poor condition it draws the eye. If the garden is South facing? the end of your garden is possibly in shade?
I would focus on this to start, and create a level shady seating area interspersed with a couple of dwarf trees that have year round interest (such as crab apple) or standard-trained larger shrubs such as Photinia red Robin. If you don’t want them planted in the ground, use a couple of large decorative feature planters. These will take the focus off the lawn and give an interesting vista from the main patio. You could pave some of it, interspersed with smaller areas of pea gravel with low growing heurcharas or other easy care plants in a variety of colours. This will also help drainage.

After this, focus on the lawn. Take your time and over a couple of years replace the current coarse grass with grass seed mixtures that are more suitable and attractive to improve the look of the lawn.
In the meantime plant up the area on the other side of the steps (After tending it for a couple of years, you will know from the maintenance if you want to extend planting to the main area and eventually replace the lawn).

If you have a patio top and bottom, it will be much easier to mow from each end of the slope using a lightweight hover mower or you could try a robomower.

Grass gets a bit of a bad press at the moment, but when I look out at my garden - where are all the starlings and blackbirds hunting for food for their chicks? On my lawn! Grass also helps to moderate the ground temperature of the garden in hotter summers.

If you try this strategy first, it is minimal cost and there is nothing that can’t be changed easily if it doesn’t suit you after a few years when you’ve had chance to assess.

This looks exactly like my son's garden. Have you also got that silly square of grass at the top where they were too stingy with slabs ? If so I would extend the patio there

Whatever you do... DO NOT PLANT MINT INTO THE SOIL!!!!
This will take over the entire garden..
Mint is lovely, but should only EVER be grown in containers of some kind, sitting on a solid surface.. as it will root through the bottom of pots into soil!!

London pride would do well there and is very pretty.

You would need to dig up the grass and remove and perhaps put a dressing h of top soil down.

You need to grow these on in pots.

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/163869269171

The end of the garden is occupied by a shed and small tree so there isn't much additional space to play with beyond what you see in the photo. It may be sensible to work on the smaller area first as a 'test run' to help decide whether I try to improve the grass on the slope or go for low maintenance plants instead.

And @Oldraver yes I do have the useless bit of grass between the slabs - perhaps your son is a neighbour or perhaps all relatively new build houses are stingy with their slabs!

At any rate it's been too wet to do much out there at the moment!

Thanks for all of the ideas, I've made some notes!