Dealing with drainage problems in a landscaping project

by Garden Services on February 12, 2012

Landscaping projects don’t just involve the placement of plants or turfing, but also include other aspects to improve the overall look and usability of the garden, such as paths, patios, decking and raised beds. As one of our recent projects illustrates, this work may also involve some less obvious tasks.

In this project, the client not only only wanted lay a new patio and re-turf the lawn, but also requested for us to investigate a problem with drainage, where part of the garden was regularly waterlogged, which was having a negative affect on the adjoining perimeter wall.

This is a common issue in Richmond/Kingston area, where the soil contains a lot of clay, which tends to clog the deep soil.

To rectify this problem, Green Drop Gardens dug up the whole length of the garden along the side of the wall to remove the original soil, installed a water-proof membrane to avoid further damage to the wall, and placed a layer of materials to improve deep soil drainage, refilled the remaining bed with fresh top soil, before replanting.

 As part of the project, we created a new patio area with York stone paving and re-turfed the central lawn area.

The result with a pleasing outdoor area, with perimeter bed, which with careful planting is sure to develop into a pleasing mature but low-maintenance border.

{ 0 comments }

A garden makeover for a rental property

by Garden Services on December 1, 2011

One of our recent projects illustrates well some of the gardening issues you may want to consider yourself if you are planning to rent out your property.
Gardens are important selling features, regardless of whether you are wanting to sell or rent, and can make all the difference between getting an offer or achieving the desired rent or not. Gardens provide much needed outdoor space, be it for entertaining or letting the kids get some fresh air, and it is important that they meet the requirements of your intended target group.
However, with rental properties there is the additional consideration that they must be easily maintainable, as tenants are unlikely to be prepared to put many hours in to with complex gardening.  Some owners try to work around this issue by making extensive use of decking or even paving, with only minimal planting, but this approach does not really work if your target audience are families with children.
Putting gardens out to lawn is an obvious solution, which works well with children, and is relatively easily maintained. However, for a lawned garden to look good long term, it is important that the process is done properly. The best way to grow a lawn is, of course, from seed, but in a makeover project we don’t really have the time available to do so. So the next best is to use good quality turf and to take great care to prepare the plot carefully  before turfing.
Here is how the above considerations affected our project:
The garden of the property in question had not been maintained well for a while and it was obvious that some work was required to make it presentable. As house was very much targeted at families with children, the client decided early on that  laying to lawn would be the best approach.
The garden was essentially a rectangular space with a tree, some shrubs and several years’ worth of weeds.
In addition, as there had been some raised beds in the past, this meant that the garden required also some levelling, before turf could be put down.
Green Drop spent a significant amount of time removing old bedding, digging out the roots of weeds, shrubs and plants to avoid these coming up and interfering with lawn once established.
The result was a simple, no nonsense garden, which would only require minimal maintenance, but still worked well an attractive outside space to kick a ball around or kick up your feet.

{ 0 comments }