The Giveaway is now closed and I will draw the names out of a (clean) hen feeder later today
After the excitement in the last couple of weeks of the patio build, it is so good to think that soon I can get started on the garden redesign. I am itching to get digging! For now though, I have been looking around on line for more ideas and have pinned more products and ideas onto my Pinterest "Dream Gardens" board (a good use of Pinterest I think).
So far, my pinboard seems to be mainly garden benches, ponds, greenhouses, cold frames and not much else - I suspect my veg growing habit is having an impact on my Internet searches! Or I just like to sit down a lot when out in the garden? Anyway, a few days ago I spent some time pruning this weeping silver birch tree near the house.
It has become a good place us to sit and have a coffee and a bit of a rest during the day as it is shady and also surprisingly dry when it rains.
After I had a good look at how my pruning efforts came out I began to think about getting or maybe even making a rustic "round the tree trunk " bench for it. It is a lovely shady spot to sit and will have a good view of the new patio (am still so excited!) and all the new herbaceous flower beds I will be planting up really soon. It is also near to where the new garden pond is going to be dug ( more excitement!) which we hope will end up looking a bit like this picture on my Pinterest board, only more wild. You can see a few images of "round the trunk" benches on there as well.
As the patio work is nearly complete I have also turned my thoughts to what sort of seating we want for it. As I discussed in a post a few months ago, our existing table and chairs are well past their prime, they are more than 10 years old, have had a hard life and have been chewed by Hornets (yes, really) .
So, time for a change. This time I have been looking at slightly more naturalistic/rustic seating. As always we insist that anything made of wood which we buy must be FSC Certified (Forest Stewardship Council) and ideally made from fallen rather than felled timber. I have not seen many suppliers who use fallen timber, so I was really pleased and surprised to find that The Garden Furniture Centre makes FSC Certified Rustic Garden Benches from fallen rather than felled timber, wherever they can. I was also impressed that they sell furniture made from recycled plastic.
I was particularly taken with this rustic bench and if you go to the website you can see a selection of different locations and surroundings where they have sited the bench for the photo shoot. Some of them could be in our garden or wood!
![]() |
Image copyright The Garden Furniture Centre |
You can also have carving on the bench seat back and I love the idea of something carved as a memorial or to commemorate a special occasion. You may, if you watch it, have seen one of these on a recent ITV gardening makeover show.
I know I said I was going to go for metal garden furniture because of the Hornet damage, but I just love wood so much! I will have to think hard about this as it IS quite a lot of money but our Wedding Anniversary is on the horizon so perhaps a bench with some commemorative message would be nice. I would justify spending the money on something so very special to commemorate that :).
Obviously I have not yet bought anything from The Garden Furniture Centre so I do not know how good they would actually be, but the website is impressive
As regards the patio, we have to clean up the slabs this weekend (using a pressure washer and brush) and then, on the first dry day next week the builders will return to finish off the pointing :) I love pressure washing things :) I find it very satisfying, in a probably strange way.
I can't wait :)
Disclaimer - I am writing a series of posts about my plans and hopes for our garden redesign - this post features a paid link to a company I would be happy to order from. As always, the words I write are my own and are my honest opinions.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Hello! Thank you for reading my blog and for commenting. I try to reply as quickly as I can and I really appreciate your interest in my life and doings here in The Compost Bin.