A patio garden is an attractive addition to any home with an outdoor room, front or back porch, or patio. It does not matter if you have a real garden or not. If you wish to complement your home, creating a cozy garden attached to the house has many benefits. It is also a great home enhancement idea that you will never regret making.
Most of us love gardens and the feel of nature around us, but many people do not have much space to create one. And if you live above the ground floor, you cannot have a garden in its real sense. But you can create a beautiful garden within your patio.
Types, sizes, and forms of outdoor rooms vary. Some are open
spaces that adjoin the house with one wall, separated with sliding or swing
doors that lead directly indoors. Other patios are sited in yards and have
nothing more than a top covering (roof) and a paved floor. And yet, there are
semi-enclosed patio rooms with two or three walls/dividers. One wall may be
made of brick and adjoining the house and the other(s) enclosed with decorative
enclosure materials. This may range from canvas to decorative lattice wood
partitions.
There are also fully enclosed ones like courtyards and piazzas.
They are more secluded and specifically designed to be private. Balcony patios
are found from the first floor to the top floor and/or penthouse in high-rise
apartments.
Your outdoor room is a part of your landscape. It should be set
up in such a way that it serves as a comfortable and relaxing recreational
area. A place where you can get-away from the indoor chatter, entertain a few
friends or have candle-lit dinners.
To create this kind of area in your residence only requires you
to turn you’re the outdoor room into a cozy garden, a part of nature, and
aesthetically pleasing sight. It should set a perfect stage as an outdoor
leisure room enhanced with potted foliage, flowers, outdoor furniture and
furnishings, and appropriate lighting. And because this space forms a part of
your scenery, large or small, it is best designed to complement the entire
landscape.
12 Ways to Create a Patio Garden
There are numerous ways you can create a garden out of your
patio and make it versatile for any activity you desire of it. So, depending on
the size of its area and its volume, you can use it in many different ways.
Listed below, you will find easy-to-create and budget-friendly garden patio
design ideas. One or more of them can help you find inspiration, or better
still, stir up your creative juices.
- Flooring - Your patio garden needs a floor finish. The choice depends on the look you want. Use faux grass to create a green lawn effect. Or pave it with any patio flooring materials like stone, bricks, or oven bamboo wood flooring if your patio has a roof covering. Wood flooring is not ideal for yard patios.
- Enclosure - You may want to semi-enclose your outdoor leisure room. To do this, add a patio privacy screen made from natural materials that complement the outdoors. Bamboo, wood lattice, woven mats, wood slats, wrought-iron frame trellis, or an imposing hedge wall are good examples. The hedge can be natural or faux outdoor plants. These will make great backdrops for your garden.
- Planters - Create rectangular planting pockets around the patio perimeter to serve as a boundary. You can also have an island planter and plant a tree or flowering plants. Boundary plant can be tall growing plants while the island can have low to medium height flowering plants. Plants can be grown on the floor level or elevated using rectangular, square, or circular pots made from wood slats.
- Trellis - Create a focal point with a tall wood or iron trellis. Add creeping plants or flowering vines. This can serve as a patio partition. Works well with open-backyard patios.
- Bench seats - Create dual-purpose bench seating around the perimeter. Can serve for seating and/or multi-sizes potted plants display. Designing the benches in varying heights adds some drama to the setup.
- Plant troughs - Arrange concrete plant troughs of varying heights and sizes (square or round) to create a perimeter. Grow bright and colourful annual plants like roses, violas, petunias, and pansies. If the patio adjoins the building, create this arrangement on two sides of the wall. Leave an opening to serve as the walk-through pathway.
- Racks and shelves - Create a vertical herb garden. Grow different herbs in small attractive pots and display them on racks or shelves. Use terracotta pots or any other types of containers of your choice. Ensure that they add colour to space. Alternatively, you can plant dwarf cacti, mini plants, and other colourful succulent floras.
- Hangers - For small patio floor spaces, create ceiling beams to hang planters of various sizes at varying levels. Keep the lower hanging planters away from the walk-path. You want to avoid hitting your head while passing through. Hang the higher ones above headroom height. Suitable for patios from the second floor up.
- Water features - Add a floor water feature with built-in lights. Fiberglass models that look like stone and rock fountains fit in well with landscapes and work well on patios. You can use a table top version if you so desire. It will still give you that garden with rushing water feel.
- Dug-out planters - For large patios, you can go dramatic. Give it some character with square, triangular, or circular pockets dug out from the paved floor. They can be arranged symmetrically or asymmetrically. Plants like the African iris, Azania’s or snapdragons can be planted in each pocket. They will grow their roots directly into the soil.
- Lighting - Light up your patio garden creatively. Choose lights that illuminate the space, especially if you have outdoor entertaining often. Commercial grade draped string lights are great for the outdoors, just like battery-operated dancing flame torches, pendant lights, wall sconces, and down lights. Add a few mood lights like lanterns and battery-operated candle lights.
- Natural shade - Accentuate the patio with a shade-producing tree planted in a large wooden tub or half-barrel. It can also serve as a screen against the wind in winter and excessive sun exposure in the summer and add a lush look to the patio. For any untidy structural elements, dead ends, or drab corners, arrange a cluster of potted plants to conceal them.
Tips
- Add some lemongrass plant or any other insect-repelling plants on your patio garden. Grow them in a couple of decorative pots to repel mosquitoes in the summer.
- With outdoor lighting, remember that a little light goes a long way at night. So, complement the landscape rather than detract from it.
- To conform beautifully to the entire outdoor space, floor the patio with natural stone, pavers, ceramic tiles, red or brown bricks, smooth pebbles, rock or pea gravel.
- Natural flooring materials will blend well with the surrounding landscape.
What to Avoid
- Plants that grow uncontrollably. It is good to be selective about the plants you choose. You do not want a patio that will eventually end up looking wild, untidy, unkempt, and cluttered.
- Over-planting. You do not want your patio to appear unplanned and end up resembling a forest of plants. If that is the look you like, that's fine, but if you prefer a manicured, well thought out garden, you may end up finding over-planting unappealing.
- Using plant colours and foliage that are not in harmony with each other and the landscape surrounds.
- Growing plants that are not adaptable to your local climate. They may die off in no time unless you tend them carefully and consistently. Planting local and adaptable foliage will guarantee that your patio looks healthy all year round.
