Garden design help

So I'm new to all this, I've been working on my lawn for about the last year and I think it's time to give the garden a full make over.
I'm trying to just get an overall design for the garden at the moment rather than worrying about exact plants, as you can see from the photos my garden tapers off towards the end and I'm wondering what would be the best pleasing shape, I do have children so really want to retain maximum lawn area for playing but I love a nice garden so want the best of both.
I'm a fan of simple modern contemporary designs.
The blue sheet at the bottom is covering a playhouse that has a leaking roof, the soil infront of the conifer on the left hand side is probably were a wooden summer house is going, the wooden garden swing is getting chucked.

I have two basic ideas at the moment, my first is a full border down the right hand side of the garden as shown by the red line roughly 18 inches deep, the second idea is to loose the border after the trees but I'm wondering if this would leave the garden a bit bare.
I would then look at having a border down the left hand side were the garden swing is now, I'm just wondering weather to pull the existing plants out on the left hand side and start again?

I do have the time to spend in the garden and we'll be here for many years so I really would like something special.

Any ideas or thoughts would be appreciated.

 

What a great space you have. I'd advise thinking long and hard about what you want to do as you might well change your mind later on.

If you want to have a border along the right hand side, make it much wider - 18inches is very narrow. You could also divide the garden with a flower border/bed in the middle, or even two thirds of the way down and make a sort of secret space, shaded by trellis/climbers or shrubs. I am a big fan of dividing up sapce as I think it makes it look bigger, but also makes it look more interesting. A path down the middle, going under a pergola with climbers over it, leading into a shady arbour? Or a place for you to get away from the kids?!

I'd remove that Leylandii though! Ruins the soil around, nothing will grow under it and lots of effort to to keep it looking smart.

 

I think the BBC website has a virtual garden design tool.

 

Chipper,

How did you get on with your garden design ....id love to see some pics ....top work on the lawn too...it was a real inspiration.

 

Holy thread revival Batman.

Nothings ever straight forward is it
When I posted this last May I was due to have some builders build me an extension in the summer, my plan was to do the garden so the extension and garden were complete .
The builders kept making excuses and putting the start date back so I decided to do the extension myself and just hire some brickies, so the garden got put on hold.
The extension is now just about complete but a couple of months ago I decided to make a few changes in the garden, after the advice above I ditched the conifer but then bought a trampoline for the kids so that went there, a couple of weeks ago I also killed all the grass and decided to start again.

So It's still a bit of a mess but when it looks better I'll post some pictures.

 

When you've kids, the garden has to come second. No point spending time money and effort on something, if you then start to worry about a ball being kicked into the borders, or sliding tackles ruining the grass.
Plenty of time to get it right once playing in the garden gives way to other pastimes (some can be equally concerning to parents like one of our kid's interest; playing American Football!) It all comes along far too soon.