How to Plan & Complete a Garden Renovation

It’s been a fun few months transforming our outdoor space in to a place we love. Now, I want to share my top tips on how to plan & complete a garden renovation.

Over the past 5 months Tom & I have been working hard to completely transform our back garden. We have a small garden that I suppose some would usually call a courtyard. Although it’s a small area though, we wanted to make the most of every inch. It required a lot of pre-planning, but now we have a garden to be proud of that we both worked hard on to make it come to life.

How to plan & complete a garden renovation

I’m going to talk you through the stages of how we completed our garden renovation. We worked on it over the lockdown period of COVID-19 so it had to be done by ourselves, and we wanted to avoid trades costs. So, let’s start at the beginning…

Create a mood board & floor plan

Garden renovation plans

We began by making a floor plan of how we wanted the garden to look. To do this, we measured the garden and then I digitally created the floor plan to scale (shown above). For reference, I used keynotes to create this, but if you’re not tech savvy, a simple hand drawn floor plan would still help you to visualise the space! Creating this floor plan really helped us visualise the scale of the space, and allowed us to experiment with a few different options without making any costly mistakes.

Things to consider when planning your garden renovation

Layout – Use a floor plan to work out the layout you want your garden to be. Think about what you want to achieve with the space. Perhaps you want maximum seating space, or more areas for growing plants/herbs.
Furniture – If you already have furniture then you may need to work this in to your floor plan. Alternatively, use the floor plan as a way of calculating how much space you have for new furniture.
Time – Do you have a deadline of when you want the work completed? Ensure your plans are feasible and realistic in the timescale you have. If you want to achieve things quickly, you may need to consider getting more hands on deck.
Budget – Most importantly, work out your maximum budget that you have to spend on the renovation. Allow extra costs in your calculations for unexpected expenses that will undoubtedly arise.

Work out where to begin…

Garden renovation

Plan the logistics and make an action plan. We knew that the first thing we needed to complete was the new fencing as we couldn’t complete anything else until that was done. If you can’t figure out where to begin, draw a spider graph or list of things that need doing, then question whether or not something needs to be done before it. This way, you’ll work out an order of tasks.

In our garden, we completed the renovation in this order…

Gutted the garden – Lots of tip runs! We removed all bushes, hedges & unwanted items to give us a clean space.
Fitted new fence panels – A first for us and hopefully the last (ha!). It was fun and games, but we managed to erect them on our own!
Painted the fence panels – It made sense to do this before laying the artificial grass.
Levelled the ground – This was tough, it took an entire day to turn the soil, remove any rubble and level it.
Lay the artificial grass – This really transformed the area and started to make it feel like a proper garden.
Painted the brick wall – This could have also been done pre-grass but the paint didn’t arrive in time due to COVID-19
Stencilled the patio slabs – This is a great way of adding some pattern to a dull space. See this post for a how-to tutorial.
Added furniture & plants – The fun part! When things finally come together.

It’s all in the details….

Stencilled patio slabs

Although just a small space, I wanted to make sure the area packed a punch. I love injecting my style and creativity in to my home and I wanted that to come through in to the garden too. Stencilling the old patio slabs was a fun way of adding some excitement & pattern in to the space without breaking the bank. We kept the old patio slabs and I simply painted them using a stencil… Simple, and cost-effective. I’ve written a separate blog post on How to Stencil Patio Slabs if you want to learn how to achieve this look.

We have also created a living herb wall which is a perfect solution for those with small gardens because it doesn’t require too much floor space. It’s also a great way of adding life to a dull wall. Ours is propped up against the back wall of our house and it adds a brilliant pop of colour and makes a great feature and talking point. If you want to know how I created the herb wall then read this post.

Enjoy it!

Garden renovation

How to plan a garden renovation

I think one of the most important things to remember when tackling any renovation is to make sure you get the most out of it. Enjoy the experience, and enjoy the challenges as hard as it may be. We watched endless Youtube videos on how to complete different tasks. From putting up fences, to laying artificial grass. It can be done by anyone but it takes a little research and a lot of patience.

Head forth in to the renovation knowing full well that you are going to face some of the unknowns, but take it in your stride and use it as a way to learn new skill and I can guarantee you will enjoy it!

How to plan & complete a garden renovation

Cosy outdoor space

How much did we spend?

For reference, I’m going to list the costs of what we spent to complete out garden renovation. If you’re planning to renovate your own outdoor space then hopefully this will help give you a guide price.

Fence panels X8 – £220 – Wickes
Fence posts x 7 – £70 – Wickes
Post crete (9 bags) – £45 – B&Q
Paint for fences (3 x 2.5l tins) – £75 – ‘Carriage wheel’ by Valspar (B&Q)
Sand x20 bags – £45 – Wickes
Masonry paint for brick walls – £75 (5litre tin) – ‘Lamp Black’ by Little Greene
Astro turf (and weed blocker) 4m x4.5m – £330 – ‘St Lucia’ by Grass Direct
Paint for stencil (5litre tin) – £14 – ‘Pebble White’ Wilko
Stencil – £40 – TSUNAGI by Dizzy Duck Designs
Slate chippings (8 bags) – £40 – Haskins
Fence shelf 3metre long – £15.50 – Wickes
Festoon lights – £20 – The Range
Garden Bench – £299 – Garden Furniture Centre
Dog kennel – £67 – eBay
Paint for dog kennel – £8 – Ronseal tester pots B&Q