Homeowners are becoming increasingly ingenious and inventive in making the most out of their smaller, split level garden spaces. Whilst completely levelling your garden is an option, this is incredibly labour intensive, time consuming and expensive. They say that sometimes limitations lead to creativity, so instead, simply accepting the levels in your garden can result in some great solutions to optimise your outdoor space effectively. It is becoming more apparent that you do not need a huge space to create a truly enviable garden. In this article, we outline the many creative solutions you can implement to best optimise a split-level garden. Let’s take a look…
Reader's Roadmap
Adding Steps
Creating a series of tiered steps to work around a sloping garden can help to differentiate individual areas of your space. Separating your garden into different independent “zones,” no matter the size of your garden, is a fantastic way to make the space feel far larger.
You could have a series of steps separating your space for different planting themes, or create a space for garden furniture, or even an outdoor seating area around a makeshift bar, firepit or BBQ. The possibilities for creating these areas in your garden really are endless, and make for the perfect space to entertain guests, especially in the warmer spring and summer months.
Tiered Decking
Decking spaces are especially popular, as they help to ease the transition from your home into your garden, helping them to feel more symbiotic rather than two separate entities. There are many different options for garden decking solutions, including metal boards, or timber and long-lasting composite materials. If your garden space is on a sharp decline or drop, we would recommend adding rigid balustrades to the perimeter of your decking, for adding security and safety.
In terms of a split-level garden, adding tiered decking is an incredibly practical way to navigate around an awkward, sloping space. In a similar way to how adding steps can create individual areas in your garden space, tiered decking can create larger platforms for you to maximise your environment. This decking space can then be easily decorated, with outdoor rugs, waterproof furnishings, plant pots and colourful, vibrant planters.
Terracing
The process of terracing has been a farming method for as long as there have been gardeners. It refers to creating different platforms for different interesting planting themes. When working around the restrictions of a split-level garden, you can convert the slope of your garden to a series of larger tiers, making a range of different planters on the separate steps and platforms.
Terracing is not only an extremely effective way of cultivating a more limited split-level space, but it can also look far more visually interesting than just simply flattening the garden and having your flowers growing on the same low level. Gardening in this way can also create easy to access pathways for you to walk along to look after your plants.