My Garden Overhaul .... Why Did I Start This ..Picture heavy

[joestifff]

Time for another update on this.

We have now enjoyed many BBQs in the garden, and my daughter loves her swing. Fruits of blood sweat and tears are paying off, I have genuinely had so much enjoyment out of this garden so far.

Obviously a few things I would change looking back, but overall I am exceptionally happy with it:

- Not to over engineer everything
- Some for of irrigation system for the raised beds and the grass
- Some sort of lighting at the bottom of the garden

On to the decking:

As you may remember I had pre drilled the 11 (yes 11) post holes for my decking that measures roughly 3.m x 3.m but in an arc. I then decided to use the offcuts from the swing as posts, as they are round and make strapping the purlins (think that is the right word) to them due to all the funny angles. These are both coach bolted and screwed to one another. Many more meters of wood went in to make a rigid frame. At this point I hadn't even postcrete them in and it was going no where.

I then postcrete and put a weed membrane in. I then found some old shed paint from the last house and chuck that about, that gets me to here:

decking 1 by joe L, on Flickr

Next I made the controversial decision on decking boards. I had been raving on all along how I was going composite. I got some quotes, good job I was sat down!!! they are a fortune, I just couldn't justify it. So a change of plan means that I have acquired some new scaffold boards, 10 of the 13 foot buggers. Now I know they will rot, and won't last etc etc, but scaffold boards are cheap and strong!

So started doing the cuts:

decking 3 by joe L, on Flickr

decking 4 by joe L, on Flickr

decking 5 by joe L, on Flickr

Bit of a wider shot of the garden so far (yes the grass got cut after this photo!)

decking 6 by joe L, on Flickr

decking 7 by joe L, on Flickr

decking 8 by joe L, on Flickr

I will be putting some preservative on the decking boards, just deciding on a colour:

I am so impressed with Osmo, it is what I have used in the garden on all the wood I will be buying this:

osmo oil by joe L, on Flickr

but first need to decide on a preservative colour:

Osmo stain by joe L, on Flickr

I am thinking a grey maybe?

I also did some tallying up on materials used. You can tell how much I have over engineered just on the pure quantity of materials:

- 10 x tonne bags hardcore
- 12 x tonne bags sharp sand
- 85 x 25kg bags cement (yes 85!!!!!!!!)
- 15 x 25kg hardcore
- 9 x 25kg yellow sand
- 4 x 25kg kiln sand
- 1 x tonne bag gravel
- 1 x tonne bag golden gravel
- 5 x tonne bags top soil
- 1,100 Marshals tegula pavers
- 55m2 Indian stone (Rippon)
- 26 green oak sleepers
- Green oak for pergola
- 50m2 turf
- 10 x 13ft scaffold boards
- Various round posts
- 50m of purlins
- 6 x 25kg postcrete
- shed load of flowers/pots

I am sure there is more, various tools along the way. I think all in it has cost me about £6k in materials to get this far and I have spent about 700 hours on it.

[8-P]

Looks good - which Tegulas are they, original ? Harvest?

[joestifff]

8-P said:

Looks good - which Tegulas are they, original ? Harvest?

They are the original. 2 pallets of them!! They're heavy buggers.

[Craikeybaby]

That is a lot of materials!

Our garden project is kicking off this week, inspired by yours, but without raised beds/decking.

[Chris Type R]

I like the look of the scaffold boards. Did you angle them for run-off ?

[joestifff]

Craikeybaby said:

That is a lot of materials!

Our garden project is kicking off this week, inspired by yours, but without raised beds/decking.

Good luck, have you or will you be starting a thread, love seeing others doing some hard work!!

Chris Type R said:

I like the look of the scaffold boards. Did you angle them for run-off ?

Yes slightly, possibly not enough, but shall see if that water will sit on it or not. I will be putting the Osmo non slip on it or the flat boards will lethal. Obviously scaffold are rough cut anyway for a bit of grip.

[Craikeybaby]

joestifff said:

Craikeybaby said:

That is a lot of materials!

Our garden project is kicking off this week, inspired by yours, but without raised beds/decking.

Good luck, have you or will you be starting a thread, love seeing others doing some hard work!!

I've got a thread going for the project as a whole. Seeing how much time you have spent on yours, I'm paying someone else to do it! It is my little boys birthday party a week on Saturday and we're hoping to have it finished by then!

[Kev_Mk3]

Fantastic transformation on the garden.

Re the raised planters what did you line them with as I am looking to make some but wasnt sure what to line them with

[dave_s13]

Looks good.

I used this stuff to point mine

http://www.nexusprosystems.co.uk/fusion.html

[joestifff]

Kev_Mk3 said:

Fantastic transformation on the garden.

Re the raised planters what did you line them with as I am looking to make some but wasnt sure what to line them with

They are lined up with a string line to the center of the garden, well that was the plan, they are not perfectly accurate, hence I put in the gravel edging.