East facing garden - sunshine?

[Vron]

Hi All,
Considering a house thats v. nice except the garden faces directly east. So, a bit of research says the garden will be overshadowed by the back of the house from the sun from about early afternoon - unless the garden is long enough.

The garden is quite long and there was a pergola at the very bottom of the garden (its a repo so can't ask). I am guessing that was the sunniest spot. Is there a rough formula to work out how long the garden needs to be in relation to the height of the house to see if the bottom of the garden will get the evening sun or be in the shadow of the house? I know it will vary with the seasons but in the summer for example will there be afternoon / evening sun?

[Amused2death]

If you know the height of the property, and the angle of the sun then you can work out how far down the garden would be in shadow at any particular time. It's simple trigonometry...in fact it's so simple I haven't got a clue as to how to do it. However, I do know the earth rotates (and therefore the sun moves across the sky) at a rate of 15 degrees an hour.

[Flintstone]

Typical PH answer

Of course, whatever the answer it'll vary with the time of year and depend upon the latitude of the house.

[Simpo Two]

Vron said:

Is there a rough formula to work out how long the garden needs to be in relation to the height of the house to see if the bottom of the garden will get the evening sun or be in the shadow of the house? I know it will vary with the seasons but in the summer for example will there be afternoon / evening sun?

A better PH answer: go and see it in the afternoon

(Saves working out the lattiude/cosine efect etc)

[Vron]

Simpo Two said:

Vron said:

Is there a rough formula to work out how long the garden needs to be in relation to the height of the house to see if the bottom of the garden will get the evening sun or be in the shadow of the house? I know it will vary with the seasons but in the summer for example will there be afternoon / evening sun?

A better PH answer: go and see it in the afternoon

(Saves working out the lattiude/cosine efect etc)

That's plan B but the forecast is rain for the rest of the week and as it's a repo it's accompanied viewing so the EA doesn't want to show you round in the evening!

[hornetrider]

Personally I would never consider an east facing garden unless it was massive - imagine not watching a sunset as you sup beers.

[Deva Link]

The upside is that east facing is the perfect direction for a conservatory! But it will make the room it's attached to even darker.

[Don]

Deva Link said:

The upside is that east facing is the perfect direction for a conservatory! But it will make the room it's attached to even darker.

We have an east facing garden with a conservatory. It can get blisteringly hot during the day...

On hot days the shade from the house in the afternoon is actually nice. In summer the sun may come around far enough to set within view of some of the garden - this is the spot in ours where we put the patio!

You will need to consider shade-loving plants, mind.

hth

[Zippee]

hornetrider said:

Personally I would never consider an east facing garden unless it was massive - imagine not watching a sunset as you sup beers.

Same here - we looked at an otherwise perfect house a month ago, but the garden lost all it's sun by about 3pm so we'd never be able to enjoy the evening sun. Needless to say we looked elsewhere.

[Bill]

Vron said:

The garden is quite long

How long? We face west and we're about 50ft from the neighbouring house (2 floor Victorian place) and we get the sun until 8.30 ish.

[Silver993tt]

If the garden is predominantly grass, there'll be noticeable moss where the sun never shines. That might give you an idea ofthe borderline between no sun and the rest.

[Vron]

Silver993tt said:

If the garden is predominantly grass, there'll be noticeable moss where the sun never shines. That might give you an idea ofthe borderline between no sun and the rest.

Thanks for that will have a closer look on Friday.

[Mr GrimNasty]

Input your longitude/latitude/time zone/date to calculate azimuth (direction) and apparent angle(height): http://naturalfrequency.com/wiki/Sun_Position_Calc...
Then simple maths to work out where shadow will be and what length.
Repeat for various days throughout year.

Edited by Mr GrimNasty on Tuesday 3rd August 17:52

[Vron]

Mr GrimNasty said:

Input your longitude/latitude/time zone/date to calculate azimuth (direction) and apparent angle(height): http://naturalfrequency.com/wiki/Sun_Position_Calc...
Then simple maths to work out where shadow will be and what length.
Repeat for various days throughout year.

Edited by Mr GrimNasty on Tuesday 3rd August 17:52

Will give it a whirl!

Here's the location you can just see the pergola in the bottom corner, all I need to do now is find out how high the house is and how long the garden is!

http://www.gorissen.info/Pierre/maps/googleMapLoca...

Edited by Vron on Tuesday 3rd August 19:09