‘it’s a space that the whole family can enjoy’

3 min read

Learning and upcycling as they went, Hayley and Andy Baty transformed their neglected garden

Feature & styling MAXINE BRADY Photography BEE HOLMES

ECLECTIC OUTDOOR SPACE

SUMMER SOCIAL The couple built the corner sofa themselves using reclaimed wood, adding a central firepit for cosy al fresco evenings as the sun goes down

WHAT WAS YOUR GARDEN LIKE BEFORE?

We bought this house because we fell in love with the unusual walled Victorian garden. Sadly, the outdoor area hadn’t been maintained for a long time, so it was very overgrown and unkept.

DID YOU KNOW WHAT YOU WANTED TO CHANGE?

Andy and I wanted a modern garden that was family friendly and low maintenance, with symmetrical elements like sleeper beds, gravel pathways and a squared-off lawn area. We were both new to gardening, however, and at first weren’t able to tell the difference between weeds and plants! So it felt a bit overwhelming to start with, but my dad, who is a brilliant gardener, gave advice and we watched countless gardening TV shows for inspiration.

HOW DID YOU BEGIN?

Within the first few weeks of moving in, we cut down a large leylandii hedge that was splitting the garden in half. The roots ran so deep that we needed machinery to dig them out! We also got rid of some of the flower beds and filled them with lavender bushes that flower all summer and don’t need much watering.

TELL US ABOUT THE TRANSFORMATION...

Over the past nine years, we have tackled a different project each summer, saving up along the way. We started on areas that would take time to flourish, such as seeding the lawn and planting lollipop trees to give us a natural privacy screen. The following summer, we built the outdoor kitchen and wooden corner sofa, using reclaimed wood to keep costs down, and turned a dilapidated Victorian greenhouse into a home office. Building an extension across the back of the house created a big drop between the new kitchen and garden, and the easiest way to solve this was to install a decked veranda.

HOW DID YOU SAVE COSTS?

Andy is incredibly handy, so he did the bulk of the work himself, including the back-breaking job of digging out the lawn so we could fit a sunken trampoline. I shopped in the sales and trawled vintage shops to find good deals for furniture and accessories, picking up discounted plants from supermarkets.

HAVE YOU LEARNED A LOT ALONG THE WAY?

Yes – that you need lots of patience with a garden project! Plants and trees can take a few seasons to fill out, so you must have faith in the process. Keep things simple, use the same planting throughout and go for a monochrome col