Patio advice needed

[Lem0nTang0]

I am very lucky that we have a huge garden attached to a small house. The garden is split into 4 sections, 1 of which is causing me difficulties.
We have a large area about 7 meters wide by 6 meters long, by my maths this is 42m2, which is currently all gravel. There are planters around the edge and borders with planting and trees and we use the area for entertaining with a table, chairs and a sofa set. It is a lovely area but as it is a huge gravel space it is difficult to walk on for some of the older people who come, and not great for the littlest visitors to crawl on and it shifts under you as you walk. (not to mention the mammoth weeds coming through despit the matting underneath).

I have had 4 quotes to pave the area which start at £12.5k up to £17k using the cheapest slabs we can find and this is totally outside of our very small budget.

Has anyone faced similar who can share their solutions to the problem. I was wondering if could pave 'islands' in the gravel to allow stable surfaces for furniture with stepping stones in between to reduce costs but cant find pictures of this to give me a clear idea of what we want.

Is it possible to pave part and then tie in another area at a later date?

I appreciate most of the cost is labour as its a large job but the materials are also quite pricy right now (wont get any cheaper while we save either) so I am considering buying slabs and storing them until we can lay them if our only solution is to save. It will be a huge investment that I cannot see us ever being able to afford in one go and dont want to get in debt over a patio.

Pave an area big enough for entertaining and plant into the gravel for an ornamental gravel bed? If it's a sunny aspect, you could get inspiration for plants from the Beth Chatto gravel gardens? https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/gallery/2012/mar/16/recreate-beth-chatto-gravel-garden-in-pictures

I agree with Fibrous - to be honest, an expanse of paving that big would look a bit sparse anyway. Surrounding your dining area with gravel garden would look lovely!

If it is sunny and you do want to lean into the Beth Chatto idea (which you really should), her book 'the dry garden' can be picked up very cheaply second hand online.

I think your idea is fine, particularly if you incorporate paths in an out of the seating area into the design. I assume your furniture is in the best spot so work out how path(s) could be incorporated into the design with maybe some pocket planting around your paved sitting area for interest. I’ve done something similar using a truncated cross shape set at an angle to maximise width (see very bad drawing) with the seating area as a square in the middle and low planting in the “corners”.

I really like Beth Chatto inspired gardens but we host large parties in the area so I will need to assess if it would get in the way, I do have some fabulous big pots currently that I move round to suit the occassion.
I am trying to picture how the different areas will work, its good to get some ideas (and a fab drawing!) as I have been staring at it for 5 years with a lack of inspiration so far.
I do like the idea of paving the dining area and surrounding it with 'dry' herbs and then focusing on the larger seating area for a louging patio