How To Make Your Garden Feel Bigger

I guess you're the lucky one who has your own garden, terrace, or balcony. A place outdoors that you can call your own.

Especially this year, when the 'everyday' life and borders around us have been shut down, owning space for gardening has been a real oasis in the middle of all the turmoil. It has offered an opportunity to be outside, connect to nature, and do hands-on things. It has helped me forget the worries, even for a second, relieving stress and giving me confidence that everything will be ok eventually. 

YOU CAN CALL YOUR GARDEN A SANCTUARY

I can tell you that I have spent most of the last spring and summer in our garden. Except for traveling for work and visiting clients in their gardens, there has been neither need nor opportunity to explore further.

I have enjoyed lunch breaks and summer evenings on the terrace. I have observed as seasons go by, and blossoms follow each other in an uninterrupted sequence. I have planted more dahlias, added new pots for tomatoes and herbs, and enlarged our kitchen garden. 

Life has been as normal as possible inside the hedges surrounding our garden. The garden has been the center of our existence for many months.  

NO GARDEN SPACE IS WASTED

When you have an opportunity to spend so much time in your garden, you learn to know it better. I might even say that you'll create a more meaningful relationship with it. 


You'll notice a want to take care of it, tend it, and make it beautiful, sustainable, and even better than before. 

As you have had this gift of time, you might have found forgotten and unused areas in your garden. Areas that could be made more beautiful and purposeful. Actually, there are quite often parts in the gardens that their owners have not even 'registered.' They might indeed be quite large areas.

Like on this site: 

Garden BEFORE

Seeing new opportunities

Here is the garden straight AFTER the makeover. Can you see how much more space they have? Now there is a much hoped-for trampoline and a whole new level field for kids and the family to play together outdoors. 

When designing or consulting with my clients, they feel their gardens grow in size. We have found new areas and room for the whole new set of activities. There have been opportunities to grow more and make the garden even more beautiful than previously.

When you look more closely and see your garden with 'fresh eyes', you'll notice you no longer want to waste any space on your gorgeous place on this earth. There are no' lost opportunities' in your garden.


USE GAINED KNOWLEDGE WISELY

Savor the knowledge that you have gained about your garden during the past months. You might have noticed problems to solve and areas that you would like to improve. How about the unused parts of your garden? There lies a seed for great new opportunities. 

Garden BEFORE

Seeing new opportunities to turn the narrow strip beside the house into a lovely stepping stone path. It has become a favorite place for children to run around the house and pick wild strawberries growing between the natural stone slabs.

To not forget all the things that you have noticed during the last couple of months, it's time to take action.


ACTION STEPS

1. Make some notes and even more. Write down all the things that you were considering regarding your garden last spring and summer. Just write it all down and add to it during the next couple of days. It does not have to be structured yet. It is your resource of notes and ideas for further use. It will be golden when you start taking action and designing the areas.
2. Take some photographs and archive them. It's great to have photos ready when you feel the itch to start planning new things.
3. Send me your question if you have found any problems or other challenges that are holding you back from moving forward with your garden project. Click here to get an A to your Q.

Fabulous! Looking forward to what new opportunities you've found and how we are gonna improve them!

PS. I have taken these photos in my clients' gardens. A huge thank you to them! The drawings were first published in a Finnish garden magazine called Viherpiha. For the magazine, I wrote an 11-part garden design series offering tips and inspiration, and featuring several examples from the gardens I had designed.