Where to start?

Hi,
We recently bought a house with a medium sized garden, not much has been done with it and I'll like to make it a nice relaxing place to sit out in and watch the birds.

I know nothing about gardening and I just don't know where to start with the place.
We've already cut down a few over grown bushes and hedges and it now looks like one big garden rather than seperate 'bits'.

I'd like to get rid of the flagstones and maybe move them to where the grass is, so that we have a patio right outside the back door. I'd like pond, an area for the wild birds and an area to sit and chill out, but I want it pretty maintenance free.

Any suggestions on what we could do with the garden? I've included some pictures. The garden is south facing and gets quite a bit of sun - we plan to chop down the hedges at some point too, so there will be even more light getting in!

Also, the part beside the garage and the neighbours fence - would that be suitable as a vegetable plot or would it not be bright enough? I think the hedges pretty much block out the sun!

I've seen some fantastic designs, but I don't have a creative bone in my body so just don't know how to go about putting on paper, or what plants to chose - where to put them etc!

Garden Before 1
Garden Before 2
Garden Garage
Garden After 1
Garden After 2

Thanks in Advance for any advice / suggestions you may have

[ 10. April 2007, 08:06 PM: Message edited by: ryiah ]

 

Just as a starter, I would hesitate to remove your hedges completely, if you like the birds/wildlife they would make a wonderfull home for them.
Could they not be trimmed a little more making them manageable.?

 

The bbc design inspiration pages might be a help to get an idea of the style you'd like - if you like playing with computer programs you can find the virtual garden software quite easily from there too and you might enjoy trying some planning with that. I'd also spend some time visiting open gardens and generally trying to make notes of what plants (particular ones and types) you like, and think about colours too.

If you need to get rid of some of your paving slabs I'd recommend Freecycle, I had loads to get rid of when i was doing what you're doing nearly a year ago and found someone that was doing the reverse!

You have some clear ideas about what you want out of the garden, which has to help - maybe you could also allocate roughly how much room you want to use for each as well?

I kind of did that then just started sketching, not masterpieces but scale drawings of where the things that couldn't move had to go, then sketch in a few other things (starting with things that had to go in one place or that I really wanted somewhere or other - e.g. I needed to allow a bit of room to park my car, needed a path to the shed, wanted a bench under my neighbour's tree, wanted my veg patch near the house, then the herb patch after that....) and after a few goes, learning from what worked and what didn't, I ended up with a rough plan of the basic shapes in the garden. Which changed a fair bit as we put it into practice!

Don't worry about it too much, just get loads of paper and a sharp pencil, ruler and rubber and dive in!

Sorry that's rather long-winded but I hope it is helpful, best of luck and have fun