Case of the Mondays: Backyard and Garden
This week, I’m sticking with the outdoors and sharing the plans for our upcoming backyard project.
Each summer we choose a project for the yard, and this year we’ve decided to work on the back garden and the front fence.
This set of projects is going to be the first to get checked off the list of to-dos. We’ll be tackling it at the beginning of June, and I’m very excited about it! I am slowly picking away at the interior projects at the house and the apartment, but this one will be done done first. We’ll be heading over to the house for a few weeks, which gives us more than enough time to work on the garden, build a privacy fence along the front of the yard, and set up a raised garden bed for our blueberries and roses.
“Each summer, we pick away at the yard, investing in updates that not only make the year-round maintenance easier, but also make the property feel a bit more ‘us’ and a little less wild-child.”
Here is a breakdown of our plans for this project:
BACK GARDEN:
To help ease the maintenance of the yard, we’ll be filling in the ‘garden’ along the back fence of the property. I think the previous owners had something planned for it, but never got around to doing anything cohesive back there. Right now, it’s mostly full of rocks and weeds and some random bushes. Our first phase of this garden is to chop down the weeds, cover the expanse with filter cloth (to prevent the weeds from growing up everywhere), and then wheelbarrowing in quite a few yards of soil and mulch to balance it out with the other garden and get it ready for planting. (Some of the items in the photos have already been removed).
A later phase will include a little Asian-inspired stone garden, with a moon gate arch (big dreams!), and a water feature. I’m swooning over these inspiration images I’ve got for it already! But I digress.
rock path and water feature
wood and rock bench
moongate
FRONT FENCE:
Next up is the fence along the front of the property. Our house is on a busy road, so replacing the wire mesh fence with a wood privacy fence will be a nice update not only for curb appeal, but fore acoustics and privacy. We’ve decided on a horizontal shadow box fence (see inspiration image below). There are already fence posts in the ground, so all we have to do is install the horizontal cedar slats, rebuild the arbor, and put in a new gate.
We’ll replace the wire mesh fence from the house along the front of the yard (6 expanses), as well as the arbor and gate.
The fence will definitely add privacy along the front of the property and help with road noise.
RAISED GARDEN BOX:
We’ve currently got a trumpet honeysuckle and some climbing roses planted on either side of the gate/arbor. There’s also an old bathtub with some blueberry bushes in it, and an old sink full of succulents, neither of which are very nice to look at (see the above photo). But not for long! Once the fence is built, we’ll build a self-watering garden box behind a portion of the fence and transplant the blueberries bushes (and hopefully a few more) into it, and find spots for the succulents. The roses and honeysuckle will stay where they are, of course, and we’ll likely frame around them.
An inspiration image for the garden box
What needs to be done:
Purchase supplies (filter cloth, soil, mulch, wood, hardware, extra plants, supplies for self-watering garden box)
Prep the area where we plan to put the garden (remove unwanted plants, chop down/remove weeds)
Lay filter cloth, weigh it down with rocks
Wheelbarrow in the soil and mulch
Measure and cut cedar planks for fence
Level and install slats
Build new gate and arbor, install
Frame out and build self-watering raised garden box
And last but not least…
BUDGET:
<$2500
I’ll document the entire process and share the end product on the blog later next month. I can’t wait to see and share the before-and-afters of this one!
Next week on COTM, I’ll be heading back indoors at the apartment and sharing my plans for the living room. I’m also planning a big solo undertaking at the apartment, too, so stay tuned for more information on that next week!
All the things,
Hello! Catherine here.
I’m a Vancouver-based interior designer and love all things creative! I’ll be sharing things that inspire me, posting design tips and DIY projects, chatting about all kinds of topics, and hopefully inspiring some people to make little changes at home to create an environment that is functional, beautiful, and a perfect reflection of you!
