Family Garden Design Ideas
A family garden can be a wonderful place. Whether you have a large garden or a small balcony your outdoor area can be utilised to make extra room for your family to come together. All families are unique and this should be reflected in your garden’s design. Adults, children and pets all have different needs and requirements when it comes to spending time outdoors. Here are some of our favourite family garden design ideas:
Family Garden – Safety first
- Keep it safe – It goes without saying that it’s important for everyone to be safe. Think about what you’re comfortable with? After all, the garden is a place for you all to relax. Think about your children’s ages and what is safe for them now and in the future.
- Water features – best avoided if you have young ones. It’s really not worth the risk with small children. It will make supervision more difficult and put the adults on edge. Once the children are older ponds and water features are great! It’s fun to find newts, frogs and other wildlife enjoying the pond. You can also use a purpose-made safety grid to prevent anyone from getting an unwanted dunk. A natural swimming pond can also be a very welcome addition as the family gets older.
- Maintain or create strong garden borders – It’s important to have clear borders around the periphery of your garden to make sure everyone is safe. Good fencing and screening plants can ensure you have privacy and stop any unwanted escapes by the family dog.
- Create Zones – As a general rule when designing a garden you put the most visually appealing or most used feature closest to the house. For a family garden, you may want to create a play area close to the house. This will help you keep a close watch on your children and pets. Perhaps if you have older children they could have their own zone further away from the house. Football areas, tree houses or rope swings are sure to be a hit.
- Soft-Landscaping – If you have small children you may consider softer landscaping. Grass, wood chippings or rubber mats will prevent scraped knees. It could also be worth avoiding gravel. Gravel is hard to ride bikes over and can be painful to fall on.
- Toxic plants – Not all plants are safe for children and pets. Here’s a list of the potentially harmful plants from the RHS.
Make it look good and still be fun
- Play areas – let’s face it, play areas aren’t always visually appealing. The bold, bright colours of toys and climbing frames can be visually jarring. Screening can be used to hide any colourful or bold toys or climbing frames. You can also use natural materials to create your play areas. Try wooden climbing frames, wood and metal chain swings, or even rope swings for a more natural look. Don’t forget to include seating nearby for adults so they can be part of the fun.
- Keep mature trees – Mature trees not only look good, but they can be climbed or used to create swings. They also provide shade in the summer or even shelter from the rain.
- Think about sports and hobbies – What’s everyone’s favourite sport or hobby? Can this be incorporated into the design? In-ground trampolines can bring a lot of enjoyment and also look good. Can you create a space you can use in the winter months? Think about pergolas and fire pits. Roasted marshmallows all year round!
- Birdbaths and bird feeders – Birds are welcome additions to any garden. For one they help to keep the pesky slugs at bay. It can be very enjoyable for children to feed the birds and watch and identify them in the garden.
- Veg patch or cut flower patch – Yes, having a veg patch requires a lot of maintenance. However, if you have space and can spare the time, it can be extremely rewarding. The children will love watering the veg patch, picking the fruit and enjoy eating fresh produce from the garden.
We hope this has given you some ideas to create your own family garden. If you’d like Emma to design a beautiful and functional garden for your family please fill in the contact form below. We can’t wait to hear from you.
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