Which is worse, north or east facing garden?

[susan198130]

We are looking to buy a new house. I absolutely love the sun and we currently have a south facing garden, but are moving out of the area. There are currently 2 houses in the running both of which seem perfect, except for the back gardens, one is east facing and the other is north facing. Both houses, the gardens are long enough that I don't think they will be completely swamped in the house shadow.

I've only ever lived in houses with a south facing or west facing garden. So I'm just wondering, if you had to pick one, which would you choose, north or east? I'm not a big gardener, so plants aren't an issue, it's just that I do like the sun.

@susan198130 we just viewed another house today with an East facing garden. The house is a wreck and but the garden is huge! I'm imagining evening drinks in my terrace at the bottom of the garden 😂
And yes I've thought the same... maybe all these N/NE/E garden houses are for sale for a reason!

East. We get the morning sun and then down the side of an evening, we have 4 different seating areas for different times of day.

I would choose the east, it is good for the garden and maybe there is a chance to watch the sunrise (in the absence of barriers)

@maddenlightfoot Arghhh there must be houses for sale with south facing gardens out there that we like!!!

I never had any sun in my east facing garden. I now have a north facing and it's so much better. We can actually sit out in it in summer. A lot depends on surrounding buildings casting shade. My east facing garden was fairly exposed as it backed on to countryside but it was miserable.

@perfumeistooexpensive

I never had any sun in my east facing garden. I now have a north facing and it's so much better. We can actually sit out in it in summer. A lot depends on surrounding buildings casting shade. My east facing garden was fairly exposed as it backed on to countryside but it was miserable.

How on earth do you not get any sun in an exposed east faced garden backing on to open countryside? Even if you lived in the southern hemisphere you'd get it in the evening.

We have an east facing house and after lunch until evening the garden is sunny.

Our house faces west-east, we have the morning sun at the back and the garden has sun on it until about 5pm in the summer, after that it's down one part of the garden. We just move where we sit.
At this time of year it has sun all day.

Our garden is at the north side of the house (back).
It gets the sun all day, until it goes behind some trees to the west of the house in summer evenings, about 6.30ish.
We don't get a lot of sun inside the house though, but that's nice in the summer because it stays cool inside.

I have a NORTH facing back garden and I absolutely love it, I have sun all day long, I get the sun from the East in the morning and from the West in the evening. I have my patio furniture on the right hand side of my garden so we can eat or just sit in the sun all evening long, we can sunbath on the left in the morning. My friend has an east facing garden and she has absolutely no sun in the evening.

I've had 2 north facing gardens and both got plenty of sun because they weren't surrounded on all sides. Current garden is north facing and there is sun somewhere all day.

Not relevant to the original post, but we looked for nearly two years before we found the right house with a south-west facing garden. My partner wouldn't consider anything that wasn't either south, west, or south-west, so it was slow going!

Worth thinking when you use it most. We have a SE Facing garden in London, average size, so don't get much evening sun. Would choose a S/W next ideally as prefer sun in evenings.

N facing is good if you want a conservatory, it won't be like a furnace in the summer. We had a N facing garden, it was great for veg and flowers- so long as it isn't overshadowed it's fine, and the conservatory was usable all year with a little heating in the winter. Flowers like to face south, so you can see the darned things from the house! Our south facing front the spring bulbs always turned their faces to the road....
East facing is going to be in shadow in the evenings. I'd prefer west for a back garden, I think, so as to be able to sit out in the sun on summer evenings. But I have to have a north-facing workroom, so it's pretty much either north or south in our case.
Our S-facing garden here is nice, as it's also a south-facing slope, but I know that if/when we build a conservatory it's going to be tricky to keep it cool enough to use in the summer.

I’ve had both a north facing and an east facing garden.

The north facing one was sunny in one corner until Midday and sunny in the opposite corner for a couple of hours in the evening. It was a great garden for shrubs and pots.

The east facing garden was sunny until early afternoon. It had a great kitchen garden.

I have a terraced house with north facing garden. I get sun most of the day as there's nothing tall east-west to block the sun. If it was east facing the house itself would block the sun from early to mid afternoon (depending on time of year) on. The added benefit is I don't get direct sun into the extension in the back which has skylights, so that space never gets too hot.

Should add I do get sun in the living room at front which I can easily control with shutters, so bright back and front.

I really think it depends on the location and the surrounding plots rather than which way the garden faces.

My back garden is 130ft long and NNW facing. We have sun all day. As a pp said, sun on one side in the morning, and then the other. It's nice having the option of shade too. I have bungalows one side of me and nothing but fields behind. So I don't have anything to block the sun apart from my own house. Only in the depths of winter does the first 5meters or so not get any direct sun.

Over the road has a South facing garden but has LESS sun as it's surrounded by big trees. I go over to water their plants when they are on holiday.

If the garden is full of plants, that might be an indicator of how much sun it receives?

I honestly love my garden. It's the nicest one by far I've ever had. It's made me fall in love with gardening.

Having lived in houses with east facing and north facing gardens I’d pick north every time! You get the sun in the morning (from the east) until about lunchtime then the end of the garden stays in the sun (from the west) until it goes down.

We have north facing, 2 storey house, detached and end of the row. We get sun all day past the shadow of the house. Patio is 8 metres from the house and has sun all day. Bench near the house so have sun or shade to sit in. A lot depends on the surrounding buildings/height of the house/tree etc
This is a good site to calculate the sun www.suncalc.org/#/52.5847,-1.8128,18/2021.09.11/22:54/1/1

Our east facing garden is lovely and cool in the morning and then bathed in sunshine from lunchtime until sunset. I'd definitely go East.

I see this is an old thread but I wanted to add one more in favour of a north facing garden. It’s perfect for us- the back of the house doesn’t get too hot (like our previous did-which would be very uncomfortable). There’s always a bit of shade which is great for hot days and the shadow from the house isn’t too big in mid winter (all 2 storey houses on our road with plenty of space). We can see lovely sunrises and sunsets from the back garden- and there’s always sun somewhere all year round. We have a fairly big plot though so you would need to consider the size of the garden and surrounding trees and buildings.

@LazySundayPlease

Our east facing garden is lovely and cool in the morning and then bathed in sunshine from lunchtime until sunset. I'd definitely go East.

This sounds like a West facing garden to me? Sun rises in the east and sets in the west