Your Garden Made Perfect

[covetingthepreciousthings]

Anyone watch this tonight?

Just catching up now, it's the same show as "Your Home Made Perfect" but you guessed it.. a garden makeover this time!

It will be on iplayer to catch up on!

It would be interesting to see how it develops over a few years. I suspect it will look lovely in summer but it did look shit last night.

I agree with you, @Sittinbythetree, especially about the veg, but I think it's about design rather than a sustainable/practical space. When questioned about the £66k, the man said that they had another room, but it's not as simple as that. I'm not sure why it looked so disappointing, but it would be interesting to visit in a couple of years and see if it looks better.

It's been said, but the problem with the £8k garden was it's lack of suitability for small children. When that baby is toddling she'll find new ways to injure herself - they needed more grass and a bigger sandpit. Oh and no sharp rocks and metal containers.

@EventuallyDeleted
"66k and it looked like a rundown crazy golf course......."

What a perfect description

I liked the little blue pot water feature in the small garden but not much else. I assumed the grass was astroturf as it was so bright green and they have nowhere to store a lawnmower, unless there was storage under the benches. Difficult trying to work with such a small, shady, enclosed space though and a vast improvement on how they started.

That small garden made me so sad that it wasn't real grass. And the sandpit was a washing up bowl! They could have made the whole of that bit lift up to be a sandpit and then have a water table. No plants really at all. It was a missed opportunity.

My last house had a garden the size of the Ealing one and I think you’re all overestimating what can be done in a space that small. FWIW I thought the decking looked good although I wouldn’t have bothered with the tiny strip of grass.

As for the bigger garden I really hope it beds in. I was hoping they’d go for the second design and I’m not sure if they fully implemented the second - the paths looked very unmade and it all seemed very scrubby. I’d love a garden if that size but I would definitely have chosen the second design.

I can't believe the budgets they have to play with! £8K to fit out 20sq mtrs? Flipping heck! I think the cost expands to fill the budget, whatever it is - £8k, £4k, £500....

And the big garden - well, nice and wild, but it takes a huge amount of upkeep to keep it looking wild and not jungle-y.

BUt what REALLY gets to me is the split-screen - in almost every shot. It's like they have a new split-screen machine and use it for everything - just one shot is not enough, lets split into 2 - no 3 - no 4!!!!

Just leave it!

I’d sort of decided not to bother watching last night because after only two programmes I’m pretty hacked off with the whole thing, but reading the comments made me watch the beginning and end on catch-up.

Dear god. Sixty-six thousand? For that?

I almost fainted at the reveal. It was hideously bad.

It was so bad. What a waste of money. And of an hour of broadcast time

I wonder what they neighbours made of it

Sittinbythetree I love your description - 'sad little mine crater' 😂
Were they missing the bridges? It escaped me in the shock of the reveal!

I think they did reasonably well in the 'yard-en' minus the sharp silver containers and the gravel. Imo decking and artificial grass would've sufficed with some deep, striking pots dotted around for interest. I don't think they wanted to garden beyond planting herbs and annuals with the kids which is fair enough in such a small space.

The gravel looked fussy and prone to migration - it would've been better as more artificial grass for the girls to play on - the strip separating the decking and 'lawn' anyway so they could hop off the decking straight onto the grass.

I much prefer real lawn but I can see the benefit of artificial grass in a small yarden. Especially when there's no shed to store a mower, the patch is shaded and you're short on time or have a young family and just want to relax in the small space.

I'd have built in a wooden raised bed and/or some tall, deep pots (as above) to get a few climbers going 😁 But that wouldn't be hard to add over time and as of now it suits their needs. Oh and some bird feeders high up on the trellis!

That was such a strange result in their garden. The lived in suburban St Albans and decided to build a miniature safari park in their back garden. I felt like there should be a fleet of little golf buggies at the entrance to transport them around to the shed and fireplace . They didn't so much end up with the desired wildlife haven as with something that looked like a run-down municipal park. Letting the adult children decide on the garden choice was always going to end up with that design though wasn't it? They just saw something wacky and the parents didn't seem to remember that the kids will be long gone and they will still be slipping into the pond on their way to collect their bikes and brushing the slime off those boulders to sit down.

but I think it's about design rather than a sustainable/practical space

Sorry. What??? A dictionary needed here…

As for the expression “Made Perfect”, I despair.

What I meant, @swimlyn, is that I think it's primarily a design programme, therefore about image and style. I don't think it's like other gardening programmes in that respect.

The problem is that we are all used to those design programmes where Alan T or Charlie D stuffs the garden with flowering plants, with barely a cm of bare earth to be seen. That looks great for the camera but a year later and you would be digging up the overgrowth. This designer is doing it properly and thinking past the cameras.

When I had a small wildlife patch done at the back of my garden years ago, I was so excited and showed my friends...and they thought I was nuts..it just looked like a mud patch!! but I could see what the plants would look like...and a couple of years later it really looked the business.

We really need to see their golf course once it has grown a bit.

Just thought I would show you What I mean.

I always love a before and after..mind you There were many years In between and it wasn’t 66k!

It wasn't the sparse-looking planting that was the problem though, it was the massive lake and gravelly paths that made it look like a crazy golf. Perhaps it will look better when the plants are established and fuller but it will still look more theme park than garden I think.

the bloke with the £66k garden was all into his bikes and lycra , should listen to his wife more
I would have been gutted

I don't agree that other garden programmes overfill the garden with plants though - certainly programmes like Garden Rescue show a finished product on the design sketches but the actual work generally looks quite bare with loads of room for plants to grow and spread and climbers to climb (will admit I can't remember any programmes with Alan Titchmarsh though so maybe some designers do put in too much to make it look good from day 1). Even if they had filmed that garden in full bloom though it would still have looked incongruous on the back of their suburban executive home and you would still have to navigate two fire features (I mean, seriously?) and all those windy paths to get to the sheds which were pretty important to them. Also they just ignored the fact that the finished product was both over-budget and yet somehow missing some of the features on the original design.

Yes the problem is twofold.
One is looks badly executed. If that garden had appeared on Rogue Traders no one would be saying - sorry that clearly is 66k worth.

Two it looks badly thought out both in terms of maintaining it, complementing its surrounding and functionality ( how do you get bikes into the shed, what happens for the 7 months it’s not in bloom).

I reckon Tom will be back in giving it some sneaky tweaks PDQ so come the summer and next winter it looks a bit more polished.

Seems this it's made the Daily Fail. I wonder if they've been reading this thread?

It was a proper mess wasn’t it, done at just the wrong time of year to show it at its worst too. I’ve got a similar style and size of garden in that it’s got lots of windy paths, plants and water and it’s fucking hard work to keep it looking presentable. These guys had never been gardeners obviously, it’s a lot to expect them to manage it going forward!

The programme format is shit too, to long, to repetitive and to many fillers.

Yes, the programme doesn't flow very well. I've just watched the last 15 mins again and like the small garden better this time but the big one seemed just as bad.

It's really missing a good garden designer. And all it does is perpetuate this idea of a manicured/hard landscaped/outdoor room as being something that's desirable which is in poor taste and rather outdated. I'd have loved a programmed that made over a garden to be ecologically sound with native plants/pollinator friendly. Maybe with a focus on wellbeing. A garden that works with a house, that accounts for the natural landscape. That's a talent. Not throwing money at a landscaper and cutting down trees.

But that's exactly what they put in this week? Lots of native and pollinator friendly planting. Water and other things were added for nature.

Agree if its mostly perennials then it may be a bit bare in winter but that's ok if it's got the trees too (like the hazels down the end of the garden)

I do agree I think the other design would have suited them better longer term maybe, but their money their choice, surely?