Most people assume garden landscaping is one job of ‘making the garden look nice’, when in reality it’s two different approaches that get folded into one project. For very large projects we will often have two teams, one focusing on hard landscaping and one focusing on soft landscaping.
Hard Landscaping
A patio going in, a wall being built, steps down to the lawn, a pergola finally going up; none of that grows. It gets built, and when built well, it sits there for a decade or more without asking for much. That’s hard landscaping, and it’s where a project often starts, because everything planted afterwards has to work around whatever structure goes in first.
Soft Landscaping
Soft landscaping is the planting, lawn, hedging, and tending the soil that holds it all together. These elements have needs that move with the seasons, need feeding, need cutting back, and will sulk if the position’s wrong! This is the work that’s never truly finished, as these elements need tending. It’s also the part people end up focusing on the most, as the resource investment gives the most obvious payoff. Ask anyone sipping a drink in their fragrant garden on a summer evening if they’d agree.
Build & Grow
With our 30+ years of experience we can confidently confirm that neither works well without the other, and that soft landscaping is a worthy commitment. Gorgeous planting will struggle against paving that holds water in the wrong places. A beautifully laid terrace can feel bare and cold with nothing planted around it.
When you get the order right with your garden landscaping, with the structure first, then organic things second, and a garden feels like it belongs together, rather than two jobs bolted end to end.
If you’re unsure which one you need, ask whether the problem was built, or whether it’s growing. Or – pick up the phone and speak to us. Our teams are LANTRA trained across both, which is part of why, after thirty years working on gardens across London, we’re usually able to take a project from the first spade in the ground through to the ongoing care that keeps it looking the way it should.
