Hello all.

Another question from me. ( Sorry ).

I have just brought a new house and and slowly fighting the indoors and outdoors into shape.

The garden I got was very badly overgrown with 2 and 3 years growth on everything. Now that I have hard pruned everything to a more respectable size, I can weight up what I have.

2 small gardens, a front and a back. Rear garden is north facing and incredibly exposes. Front garden is south facing and has some shelter. Front garden is sandy loam, rear garden is clay/loam mix.

I have a number of large shrubs, mostly buddlia along with a few large tree's. Talking to the neighbours, there is very little in the way of planting in the ground itself, no bulbs etc apart from a few daffodils.


My aim is, over the next three years, to get the garden into a more plesant condition.The problem that I'm facing is that I really don't know where to start, and I'm confronted with such a huge amount of choice plants that I getting a little confused.

This is my ( very brief ) three year plan. I wonder if I could get some comments on it with any suggestions on what to do, what could be better etc?

Year 1 ( starting from now )
This year I just want some colour in the garden and some practise at gardening, as I'm new to it all. The idea is to plant a load of bulbs and annuals throughout the year and see what looks good.

I want to see the garden in all seasons, learn the micro-climates, learn what sort of colours, shapes that I like etc. I also want to improve the soil a LOT, as there is a huge amount of stone and rubbish in it. I am thinking of getting a large riddle in a frame and hitting a border at a time while the garden is fairly bare.

Year 2
Remove some of the larger shrubs and maybe a couple of the trees and add in perennials and different shrubs. Add a bits of hieght to the garden. fewer bulbs. Keep improving the soil

Year 3
Remove some more of the tree's and the existing shrubs, add in more bulk to the existing planting schemes.


Becuase I'm new, I don't want a hugely impressive garden, just something that is nice to sit outside in and doesn't need a huge amount of work. By the end of the three years, I want to have interest and colour in the garden for most, if not all of the year, and have it fairly self-perpetuation. I'd like to get it to a point where it's full of self-seeding/perenial plants that do something in all the seasons.


Am I taking the right approach? Am I going to slow? Should I get all this done in two years?

Also, from experience, is it actually possible to have a fairly simple to maintain garden that is interesting all year around? Or does this take a whole lot more effort than the books suggest?

Many thanks

Steve