May I ask you about how your garden is planned?

May I suggest Anna Pavord's The Border Book. You could probably borrow it from a library or buy a used copy. Lots of planting schemes for small (and large) spaces.

Ohh Helen321, my garden is basically a lawn & a veggy plot plus flower borders.
It's been a garden for rowdy boy children & dog's for donkeys years!
I have a Horticultural degree so it's quite embrassing really.
Ps, Sow some cosmos it makes everything look better + some tall simple daisies, simple & lovely. 🌞

Ours was unplanned when the DC were young, just a lawn and patio, but it has a slope.

When they were older DH drew a proper plan and we started to terrace it with borders, but the underlying rocks made that difficult, even with help so we gave up on that.

Borders with shrubs, a border with herbaceous plants and a terraced vegetable garden with paths and not very wide flat beds. Lots of flowering weeds now too but apparently wild is good!

A patio, and a gravel garden with lots of pots is easy.

Work with what you have!

I imagine garden designers start by asking questions like, ‘How will you use your garden?’, ‘Which direction is south?”, ‘How much work are you prepared to put in weekly?”and so on. Are there walls, fences or hedges, and are there any trees (yours or neighbours) that shade parts of the garden? Do you have dogs? Look at neighbours gardens to see what grows well in your area, and visit Open Gardens to get ideas. Do you like a fairly formal scheme, or a rambling, country garden look? Space for a shed, greenhouse or summerhouse?

www.rhs.org.uk/garden-inspiration/garden-types/small-gardens
www.bhg.com/gardening/design/styles/small-garden-ideas/

Working from home during Covid - I was at my 'desk' in the kitchen and was disillusioned with my view of our small lawn plus small fishpond with horrible grey wall of garage on the right. I started talking to DH about knocking the garage down as it was full of junk and we never ever put the car in the garage anyway.
We ordered a skip, the first of many (as did many during Covid) and started by emptying the garage. Then took the roof off and knocked down two-thirds of the garage, intending to keep the other third as a store for pond equipment, pumps and so on. SonIL helped as massively as COVID restrictions were beginning to lift. We gradually skipped all the rubble, broke up the floor, put in french drains to sort a boggy lawn and then built planters, greenhouse, put in new fencing, and new patio then brought in 14 tonne of top soil. By this time, family were able to help with shifting this and we rotovated and flattened the soil and seeded it. Rebuilt and re-lined the pond.
4 years on we have a garden we are happy with - not too much maintenance to do as we put in plants which come up every year or need chopping back periodically. Which is just as well as DH is now retired and beginning to struggle a bit with mobility. It wasn't following a grand plan of any description but lots of thinking out loud and would this work or not to create a more spacious garden?
It was hard work for a good few months and then it was a case of sitting back to watch the grass grow and filling in bare patches with more seed!! Now the GCs love the garden, love playing with their sandpit, water pool and growing things from seeds and then watering everything. It is just lovely having a coffee or cool drink under the canopy on hot days in our south west facing garden.
Do what makes you happy - it can be your piece of paradise!

I planned mine out to be semi-formal when we moved here, I still have the plan somewhere, but what we have is nothing like the plan but I love it. It's cottage-gardeny & a lot of the plants I've been given /seeded here /cuttings.
It's probably better that way because the south half of our garden is shaded by 2 forest-sized trees, so I just grow whatever will thrive in the shade that side, if I had done it to the plan it wouldn't have been symmetrical anyway.
They do recommend not starting for at least 6 months - keep a notebook & record which areas get sun, which areas catch the wind & frost, note anything that's thriving & attractive in neighbours' gardens through the seasons, anywhere where it doesn't drain well. Then you'll have an idea whether plants you would like will work, & best area to have a sitting area etc.

I recently saw Adam Frost speak and he was fantastic on garden design. He starts with the existing plot. He considers how the sun moves around it, the windy bits, the sheltered bits etc. Then he asks himself how he'll use the garden - where he'll sit for his morning coffee, afternoon tea etc.

The next step is to create tiers - if you're neighbour has a pretty tree, start with that and work down - put a tall shrub in front of it, then a smaller one - then you can make your garden look like it goes on and on, or hide an ugly shed next door. He explained how birds like these tiers and also how tall shrubs and trees can capture evening fragrance around seating areas.

On plants he pointed out the importance of leaf colour and shape - flowers can be fleeting but leaves last much longer.

If you get a chance to see him I really recommend it.
Some interesting things here www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQKEkzFcsgU

My advice is just the opposite of Churchview, Our large garden came fully formed with little beds everywhere. I simplified it to a large lawn with sinuous edges and a veg plot and wild garden

I am then a great advocate for just buying plants up and bunging them in and seeing how they do, then adding and subtracting as you go. Most of the plants in my garden come from the bargain sections of garden centres and supermarkets. I once bought 25 sbrubs from Woolworths for £24, at the end of the summer season. I planted them with care and most survived.

Just start by planting things, anything you can get hold of, and if they are wrong dig them up and replace them, some will die and some survive, take out any plant that is clearly misplaced.

We have just sold our house. One of its great selling points, that everyone commented on was the lovely garden. Part its setting, but part that if you fill it full of greenery and do not worry too much, it can still look good.

Helen321

Did you have any particular design or style in mind when starting your garden or did you just figure it out as you went? I don't have a lot of space but still want to plan something nice and not just flowers here and there, but I truly have no idea where to start.

The first question any garden designers will ask is, ‘What’s your budget?’ Hard landscaping will soon eat into it so it’s a good idea to use or recycle any paving, gravel or metal structures you already have.

Decide on a style and stick to it. Get inspiration from books (your local library will have plenty,) magazines and online sites like Pinterest.

When adding pots go for big and bold. Nothing looks worse than the spotty dotty effect created by small pots plonked in random spots. If you want to use small containers, group them together so the plants have a chance to merge.
Remember that large stone or terracotta pots will be nigh on impossible to move once plated up so don’t be put off buying lightweight, plastic ones. It’s great fun creating paint effects with a few spray cans. Dark grey and rust are bang on trend at the moment! 😂

Another advantage of pot planting is you can decide exactly how you want your garden to look before planting anything out and it’s much easier to create the follow on effect as the seasons change.

Another thing to think about is future maintenance particularly with shrubs.
Were none of us getting any younger. 😂😂

Just instinct. New build bare garden with weeds

I wanted height and fruit so I started with that, 4 apple trees on M26 rootstocks, then 3 standard gooseberries and three Ben Sarek blackcurrants. That was the structure

I did not want grass and did want to support bumble bees, so ground cover all over was next, sedums and pops of echinacea and hardy geraniums, plus a few roses in the ground and three up cast iron obelisks

It just evolved and is gorgeous, like a fairy dell and takes very little maintenance

I put several rubber stepping stones down too, I stand on those when possible

One of the apple trees is a tall jelly king crabapple, it is in the far corner, not near the fence to cause nuisance. I have a green metal seat below it, made in Haiti from old oil containers. Last year I alo popped a rowan into the ground. I have finished my garden

Gardens are never finished!

I take photos of anything I like the look of, particularly combinations of plants together, and try to recreate a similar effect. A beautiful tree, even if you only have room for a small one (I like acers, and I’ve got a eucalyptus in a pot, and shrubs that will give you year round interest between them. I’ve also done a bit of zoning, so I’ve got winter interest in one area near the house, spring in another few areas, etc. I think if you make a bit of a statement in one area for a season you really notice it, rather than odd plants dotted round everywhere. I love flower arranging, so I’ve also got cutting shrubs, and grow flowers to cut.

Well Chelsea it isn’t! But I bumble along thoroughly enjoying myself year after year, trying out different planting designs and styles.

I mainly have shrubs so don’t buy many plants

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Thank you everyone for all of your thoughful answers!!!

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

With gardening no amount of books will tell you the real truth about your particula garden.
Look at where the sun is through the year. Look at what is already growing there at different times of the year.
Look at what is growing in your neighbours gardens that will tell you what the local conditions are like, and what will thrive.
I recently visited someone's garden and she couldn't figure out why some of her plants weren't growing? To me it was simple, there was too much shade. She was working against nature and not with it.
I think the best advice I can give is to give a year to see what the space looks like in different seasons, to 'learn' from what is already there.
That's my gardening style- you may prefer to get a load of plants and hope for the best but to me that isn't gardening at all.

My suggestion is concentrate on having a basic framework. A tree for height - crab apple, maybe? Lots of lovely small trees to choose from…
Then a couple of shrubs (or more, depending on how much space you have).
I think a basic framework will help you visualise things a bit more. Good luck!

Think our garden was designed years ago by an artist.so wd inherited an enormous shed, large pond and lots of big trees. A Magnolia, Scots fir,bamboos etc .The pond had to go the concrete was cracked and leaking. But felt so sorry for the frogs.
We still have the four statues.
So we have just modified what we have.

loopyloo

Think our garden was designed years ago by an artist.so wd inherited an enormous shed, large pond and lots of big trees. A Magnolia, Scots fir,bamboos etc .The pond had to go the concrete was cracked and leaking. But felt so sorry for the frogs.
We still have the four statues.
So we have just modified what we have.

Sounds beautiful 😊