Planning a garden transformation: a step-by-step guide

Start with how you will use it

Before choosing materials, write down how the garden needs to work: where you will eat, where children will play, where the bins and bikes go, and which views from inside the house matter most. Almost every layout decision follows from that.

Zone the space

• Hard standing near the house for dining and access
• Open lawn or play surface in the main body of the garden
• A destination at the far end — seating, a shed or a specimen tree
• Utility tucked to the side, screened rather than hidden

Deal with levels early

Level changes are the most expensive thing to alter later and the thing that most improves a difficult garden. Retaining walls, sleeper beds and terracing should be settled at the design stage, not improvised during the build.

Sequence the work

The right order is boundaries and structures, then groundwork and drainage, then hard landscaping, then the lawn, then planting. Doing it out of order means damaging finished surfaces or working around them.

Budget honestly

Groundwork, drainage and waste disposal are unglamorous and account for a large share of the cost. If the budget is tight, reduce the scope rather than the preparation — a smaller, properly built garden beats a larger, poorly built one.