Why Do You Need a Garden Designer?
Brisbane is home to some wonderful outdoor spaces of all shapes and sizes, calling out to be developed and enjoyed. If your garden is tired and needs renovating or has to be started from scratch, important decisions must be made.
Creating a garden is not always as simple as it seems. Whether you’re looking for a new or renovated garden, you have the highest chance of success if you start with a plan.
Having a consultation is the most crucial stage of garden design. As a Brisbane-based landscape designer, I’ve completed hundreds of consultations with clients, and this process provides the perfect foundation from which to create the garden of your dreams.
Garden designers know how to make your garden work for you
I’m a qualified horticulturist and experienced landscape designer who has been helping Brisbane homeowners transform their outdoor spaces for thirteen years. I often advise homeowners that investing in a designer pays off in the long term. I’m often quoted as saying,
“In the long run [having a garden designer] will save you money because you’ve thought about your garden as a whole picture rather than attacking it in little bits. Even if you implement it in stages, you’ve got that plan that you can work towards at your own pace.”
The difference between developing your garden yourself and hiring a garden designer can be significant. No matter how much you love digging and planting, doing so one step at a time can end up with a haphazard result that you may then wish to change. Many plants can also die if they are not chosen well, costing you more money over time.
A good designer will start by consulting with you about your lifestyle and how you plan to use your garden when it’s done. They will also consider how much time and interest you have for gardening and maintenance before deciding which planting scheme is likely to work. This is the groundwork for a garden design that Brisbane homeowners will continue to enjoy for years.
A Great Garden Has Structure
A well-designed garden is a carefully considered series of spaces that lead you from one area of your garden to the next, combining striking planting schemes with practical utilities, relaxed social areas and cool, inviting shade. Garden design is for Brisbane garden lovers who want a unique outdoor space that is beautiful and functional at the same time.
No matter how big or small your garden, professional design can take it from good to great. With careful planning, landscaping and planting, the space can be carefully managed and controlled to create mystery and structure that wasn’t there before. Landscaping – the heavy work of restructuring the levels, paths and shapes within your garden – is more effective if properly designed, creating striking surprises that never arise by chance.
Perhaps surprisingly, planting requires as much time and attention as the hard landscaping to create a really good garden space, as anyone who has experienced disappointing results will be happy to share.
While many gardeners love testing different plants against one another, successful combinations are often a matter of chance; what looks good at first may feel out of balance when your planting matures. Height, structure, colour and even flowering times will dictate whether your planting scheme is a success. A garden designer is familiar enough with plants to know how your plant combinations will work over time.
Garden design is all about design
You may be a hard worker and a great gardener with the kind of green fingers that can revive a dying plant in a drought, but this doesn’t automatically make you a designer. Garden design requires the kind of problem-solving and eye for detail that takes a nice, usable garden to a visually stunning outdoor ‘room’ that suits your personality and lifestyle down to the ground.
Garden designers will create your garden according to a theme, from a cottage garden to a tropical paradise, with space, materials and planting all chosen to fit, as well as incorporating lifestyle elements such as a barbeque space or a pool. The advantage is seeing and discussing your plan before a single spade hits the ground, saving you the time and disappointment of an idea that doesn’t pan out.
If you’re still concerned about costs, it’s worth mentioning that a designer can improve the value of your Brisbane property, creating that all-important street appeal and the attraction of a well-thought out design that requires no work at all to enjoy.
If you’re still concerned about costs, it’s worth mentioning that a designer can improve the value of your Brisbane property, creating that all-important street appeal and the attraction of a well-thought-out design that requires no work at all to enjoy.