New build blank canvas

[TommyH]

Hey guys and girls

 

After a little help and wisdom please. A little bit of back ground.Me and my girlfriend are buying our first home, which also happens to be a new build. We've been amazing lucky to get a rather large garden for the price at 15m x 8m. The builder wanted over £1000 to turf it so it was a no go from us. 

 

I'm in the army so trying to design it to be as maintenance free as possible for when I'm away. I have a rough plan in my head but I'm stuck. The garden as an incline, it's not massive but its enough that I want to add a retaining small retaining wall in and make it two levels.

 

My question is: should I start by building the retaining wall first then build the rest of the garden? It might seem a stupid question but I'm genuinely confused and slightly overwhelmed on where to start with it all. 

 

 

[Ferdinand]

Welcome.

 

1 - Depending what you intend to do, you should first be aware what sort and quality of soil you have, and what is in it (eg lots of rubble that needs removing or coping with).

 

2 - Do you have a plan for what is going where? eg sitting area etc.

 

3 - On the wall, there are lots of ways of doing retaining walls - and you need to think about retaining the soil round the outside - fences won't do that for long.

 

(As am aside, we are in process of starting a Buildhub Gardening Blog which may - or may not - be useful for you. It will appear this bh weekend. I hope.). 

 

Ferdinand

[tonyshouse]

Slopes are free retaining walls cost money

 

grass seed would work well, I used to sow rugby pitches in my teens with an expert, we used 1/3 oz per yard, equates to 10g/m2

 

everyone wants to sow thick but the rugby pitches are still there 50 yrs later 

 

I also sowed lawns in my previous two homes at that rate and they were brilliant, never work out, I used a mixture without reygrass, red fescue, chewing fescue and brown bent

 

sowing thin gives seedlings room to establish and one seedling under any hand print was enough, too thickly sown and seedlings are over crowded.

 

prepare the ground well dig remove rubble and lumps, grade to an even slope rake and screed loads, allow to settle and re do then sow 

 

good luck and enjoy it is hard graft