Gravel a garden with restricted access

[NotmyRLname]

I want to gravel my garden but it’s a typical Victorian terrace with no drive and no rear access ect. I know it must be possible somehow but how?

How do you get int and out of the garden, through the hallway, then kitchen or something?

We have a sort of side access but not, you have to go through 2 doors, and we bought one of those plastic wheelbarrow things that isnt a wheelbarrow, more like a sort of shopping trolley shape

It took ages and ages, back breaking it was

Can I ask why?
Only because I’m looking on RM at properties at the moment & every time I see one with gravel I mentally calculate the time, effort and cost of removing it all and just discount the house. Is it just to reduce gardening or something?

Garden shows usually go through a neighbouring garden, or hire a massive crane to lift things over the roof but I imagine that’s an expensive way to get a bulk bag of gravel to your garden! Maybe you will just have to buy a small bags and carry/wheelbarrow them through the house?

Put dust sheets down in the hall, etc. and bag/bucket it through. Get a sack barrow if the internal doors are wide enough.

Do you know how much you need?

Please don’t unless your garden to be the local cat litter box.

100% this. We have gravel for our front drive, just a quick fix to make it presentable, and the cats just love their large litter tray, especially right by the drivers door🙄

You'll have to move it through the house, but I agree with those above this is an unwise choice.

As a fellow Victorian terrace owner who considered carrying gravel up a flight of stairs and down a flight of stairs to get it into the garden - do not do it.

We did a combination of paving and decking, which looks fantastic. The decking, 6 large buckets of rubble we had to remove and the 15 paving stones we laid weighed considerably less than even half of the gravel that would have been required.

@ClaudiaWankleman i like gravel for the look, and it’s drainage. We have decking at the moment and despite care it’s rotted and nasty in just 6 years. We also have a concreted area and grass. I’d like the grass and decking gone just no idea how

@DogInATent 5 or 6 tons! 😬

@WhirlAndCleek why would you need to remove it though? It’s one of the most hardwearing options, great for keeping flooding or water away from the house.. what would you want instead?

If you’re planning to ever sell the house, gravel might not be the best option, as the green space is gone… I spent a week scraping off gravel and underlying plastic sheet that was falling to pieces in the garden of my newly bought house, that the previous owner had thought stylish, it was a nightmare! Didn’t view a few houses just because of these “gardens” I.e. tarmacs etc.

Don't put gravel down. It's a nightmare to keep it weed free. I wish I'd kept the lawn. It only took 15 minutes to low!

why would you need to remove it though? It’s one of the most hardwearing options, great for keeping flooding or water away from the house.. what would you want instead?

I would want grass, to be able to sit on it or let kids play. Or a smooth surface that you can move things across easily, eg kids’ toys. Gravel isn’t at all child friendly, it gets stuck in stuff, it’s easily thrown, it hurts when you fall on it, and cats like pooing in it.

If you have large stones (min 2.5cm) cats don't use it as litter.

No grass at all in the back garden? Just concrete and gravel? It's it a really small courtyard garden or something?

This. I inherited a garden with larger gravel stones and my cat hates walking on it yet alone using it as a litter tray. I am not keen on it but have kept it due to cost and it looks fine, I have broken it up with lots of pots and planters.

Although that information doesn't help with getting it through the house! I guess get it delivered to the front and take it through by wheelbarrow.

I have slate chippings (put down by the previous owners, but I've no objection to them as it's a tiny, shaded yard and the slate looks much nicer than the concrete it's over the top of) and no cat toilet issues here.

Good quality decking installed properly should last 10-15 years with minimal maintenance. You mention the benefits of gravel for drainage and flooding benefits - how damp/wet is your garden?

As a PP have mentioned, gravel gardens aren't popular with everyone (although it's probably not as marmite as plastic grass). Get the grade wrong and you end up with a 6 tonne cat litter tray.

Unless you get a crane to lift it over the house (expensive) the usual option if there's genuinely no garden access (if it's a Victorian terrace, what were the soil arrangements? - or has the rear access been reclaimed by everyone as extra garden?) is to handball it through. There is one alternative, I've seen builders use narrow portable conveyors to move materials through houses or down narrow paths. It's worth contacting a few grounds contractors to see if they can help.