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Original poster

flattening a garden?

19 replies

givemewine · 04/01/2008 16:44

We're soon moving into a new build. It has a reasonable garden but it's all sloped quite heavily, so we'd have trouble siting the kids play stuff - trampoline etc, and paddling pools just wouldn't work. Anyone have any experience of flattening a garden like this, is it possible and how much does it cost? thanks!

OP posts:
lalalonglegs · 04/01/2008 19:53

Yeah, our old garden was almost vertical. I designed a series of retaining walls and got the local builder to put them up and render them and then dh and I backfilled them with rubble and topsoil then turfed over the top. It was REALLY hard work - everything, including 40 tonnes (yes, really) of topsoil and five tonnes of slate chippings had to come through the house by wheelbarrow. It took us four long weekends over a summer but it did make the garden (a) gorgeous (b) useable.

Also, because I took this route rather than employing "landscape architects" or whatever, the cost wasn't massive, probably a couple of thousand (although this was a four or five years ago). At the time, I also wrote to be in a Diarmuid Gavin series and BBC researcher said the project sounded really good but I would have to pay part of costs and that would be at least £12,000

Original poster
givemewine · 05/01/2008 10:37

Thanks lala. That does sound hard work, but worth it. at the BBC series, 12,000???
I am looking into landscape gardeners but must admit they do look expensive, and we are wondering what we can do ourselves. Helps to know it can be done!

OP posts:
LIZS · 05/01/2008 10:40

yikes that soudns a lot . We're planning on having 2 levels in ours but there will be a slope to each. Can you get sleepers or similar to enclose smaller areas for the trampoline etc which can be levelled ? Thinking of doing so for a climbing frame.

noddyholder · 05/01/2008 11:57

It does cost a fortune and the amount of soil removed is mind boggling.

Original poster
givemewine · 05/01/2008 14:10

Smaller areas with sleepers sounds a good solution liz if it turns out to be too expensive, I guess we could make an area with brak chippings or something similar.

OP posts:
HarrietTheSpy · 10/01/2008 01:37

We are thinking of buying a place with a seriously sloped garden. It is really putting my husband off. Otherwise the house is great.

LaLaLonglegs, is there any chance you have some before and after shots you could post? Also, if your house is a terrace or semi terrace, did you have to consider the neighbours' garden(s) and whether that could destablise them somehow or have an impact on the boundary fence? This house is a terrace and I was wondering what would happen to the gardens on either side if we started digging away aggressively.

anniemac · 10/01/2008 12:02

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

CountessDracula · 10/01/2008 12:04

How long is it? My dad's garden was sloped and he made it into 3 large terraces. It is long though

ComeOVeneer · 10/01/2008 12:05

We had ours flatten shortly after we moved here because it sloped downwards toowards a low concrete wall (about 1.5foot high) and ds ran, fell and gave himself a black eye on said wall. We needed a lot of soil to raise the level (it took them 2 days of tooing and frooing with wheelbarrows to do it. We paid £5000 but that included returfing, removing a tree, staining the fences and a few other bits and peices.

HarrietTheSpy · 11/01/2008 00:01

Can anyone at all show me pictures of before and after?! Would be soo grateful. This place we are thinking of slopes down to a concrete was too.

Can anyone recommend a landscape gardener in London?

fortyplus · 11/01/2008 00:32

A general builder would do it. Ours was only a slight slope but we had a retaining wall built with stone steps. Cost will vary according to materials and height and length of wall (suppose that's obvious, really).

We were having an extension built so had all the earthworks done at the same time to save money.

HarrietTheSpy · 11/01/2008 00:48

Maybe I should get a builder to look at it.

HarrietTheSpy · 11/01/2008 00:51

I googled this subject and guess what it brought up - our thread!

lalalonglegs · 11/01/2008 13:06

It was a house we used to live in - I will have a look for photos but the before ones were from 5 or 6 years ago so may have been chucked when we moved. It was a terraced house and we simply built retaining walls along boundaries of where the boundaries were to create sort of giant troughs. Ours was very long (55m) and sloped away from the house very steeply, flattening out a bit towards the bottom. We created a terrace at the top then three curved lawns and a big sloping herbaceous border.

HarriettheSpy, I live in London and would be happy to look at your garden and give you some ideas (free) - I really enjoyed the design process of doing my one (although not the work) and because the house was listed we used to have it open on Open House Day and people were always very admiring of it (modest ). CAT me if you like the pix - I am away from home until next week but will post them.

HarrietTheSpy · 12/01/2008 00:57

Lalalonglegs
Would be so grateful for that - thanks so much for your message. I was wondering if you'd peek at this thread again. We live in London too.

We are going back to see the house tomorrow for a third time. What I am actually going to do is ask DH to take a picture of the garden if he can. If you don't mind, I could CAT/email this to to you. Even if you don't find the before and after pictures, which might well be too much trouble, if you could give me some thoughts as how transforming the garden, given the angle, might compare to what you went through, that would be really helpful.

The house means taking on a much larger mortgage and the garden is a big sticking point for DH. It would be great to get an opinion from someone who has been through this as to how hard it might be to restructure it.

Thanks again - have a great trip.

discoverlife · 12/01/2008 01:56

Im have to get in about 8 tonne of soil to level off a section of garden for our swimming pool,(above ground one) and that is going to be a big job getting it dumped at the end of the drive and having to wheelbarrow it 400 metres to level off the ground.

lalalonglegs · 12/01/2008 10:18

Yeah, CAT me, no problem. I'm pretty sure I can dig out the after picture - before doesn't really show much because apart from being very, very steep it was also very overgrown so it may not be that useful but I'll have a look for them both when I get back home.

HarrietTheSpy · 13/01/2008 16:36

Okay, the estate agent was hot on our heels the whole time, and we did not feel comfortable taking a picture. The owner was also there. Since it's 50/50 whether we'll get it, I didn't push it. Also, it transpires the fundamental thing for DH is that for the money he is not looking out onto rolling fields with room for chickens, not simply the vertical nature of the garden.

If we do have our offer accepted, I will be going there snapping away. IF the offer still stands then...if it's okay to get in touch Lalalonglegs, I would appreciate it.

thanks again

lalalonglegs · 18/01/2008 06:59

HTS - have been searching for photos but can only find electronic version on old Mac which appears not to be jpeg and therefore unsendable. Grrrrr.

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