David Domoney: How to create two seating areas in your garden using Porcelain Paving
3 October 2023
Exploring imaginative ways to partition your garden is a delightful endeavor. When envisioning your garden's design, your goal is to establish a harmonious, seamless flow throughout the space, whilst sculpting out distinct zones that cater to your specific desires.
The adoption of a single, gracefully winding paving style, that elegantly meanders through these garden zones, can often be more visually appealing than delineating the areas with various paving styles.
This garden has masterfully achieved this by embracing Pavestone's Natural Stone effect porcelain paving 'Greystone' as the prevailing choice across its entire expanse. Opting for a singular paving style has enabled the seamless unification of the various garden areas, resulting in a cohesive and harmonious design. The versatile nature of this paving, with its blend of contemporary allure and yet rustic charm, makes it the ideal paving in this setting, complementing the garden style and planting with an effortless sense of belonging.
Patio Furniture
Whilst the dining furniture and lounging area are of different styles, they work well together in this space due to the unity the shade of paving offers, complementing both the classic look of the table and chairs, and the clean lines of the contemporary black metalwork on the sofa set. This just goes to show how versatile this paving is, sporting a modern feel thanks to its clean, dove-grey shade but being indistinguishable from rustic sandstone creating a timeless setting.
Patio planting
The paving borders are softened by some lovely planting, creating privacy, and adding colour to warm up and brighten the neutral-toned area. The bright purples of the Verbena bonariensis stand out well against the contrasting yellows of the Rudbeckia, again creating a warm and inviting view from which to enjoy refreshments during your late-summer garden soirees. And a vase of bright pink cut Callistephus chinensis, asters, will offer a dab of cheerful colour against the dark, wrought-iron furniture. You can grow your own asters for cutting easily at home, and they’re great transitional flowers from summer to autumn to give a little late colour.
A Perfect Pathway
A set of paved stairs transport you to a winding pathway which takes you across the edge of the garden beds and lawn to another area. The high slip resistance of Pavestone’s Natural Stone Porcelain is perfect for the job, allowing safe movement down the steps and across the garden. The darker colour of the Greystone has been contrasted well with the white walls and darker brickwork, guaranteeing it stands out well but is settled into the area thanks to the continued use in the pathway, and edging to the garden borders.
Sympathetic Design
The winding pathway has been achieved by separating each slab of porcelain with gravel, which aids the paving in melting into the environment more. The tones of white, grey, and brown all complement the natural-stone look of the paving, whilst also continuing a neutral backdrop for the colourful garden borders. This really encourages your bedding plants to pop in contrast, brightening your garden with ease.
Relax in a Suntrap
The winding pathway leads into this separate part of the garden, isolated by plants, including some lovely Lavandula x intermedia, Dutch Lavender, softening the edge of the paving which has been laid and cut into a perfect circle. By having these mid-height plants create a border around your paved area, you can not only integrate the paving better into the garden but also create a small wall of privacy, setting this area apart from the rest of your outdoor space. Plus, the Lavender has a familiar and calming scent, and is brightened by the shades of more bright Rudbeckias and Argyranthemum, pink Marguerites, for a pleasant and relaxing atmosphere.
Colour & Shape
This circle shape is set off by the round archway heading into an additional lawn area, where the paving ends. Pavestone’s Natural Porcelain Paving in Greystone is the ideal neutral base from which to add to this design, with plants of any colour being suitable to pair with it, and the darker furniture contrasting well with the lighter shade of grey.
By cutting the paving into a circle, this section of the garden is separated from the dining area both in style and by location, but by using the same paving the design is continued effortlessly. Plus, the use of winding paths really helps to provide a transition from the square, clean angles of the dining area. A spot like this is perfect for some quiet time for afternoon tea with a friend, or even some privacy with a good book.
Jon Layton, Group CEO of Pavestone:
The landscapers behind the construction of this garden are Village Landscapes. As professional installers, they understand the requirements of their customers and recognise that a quality product like our Natural Porcelain adds a high-quality finish that you deserve in your garden. As David has written in his blog for us, many clients want their hard landscaping to integrate seamlessly with the overall design and I feel this is a wonderful demonstration of how best our products can be used for a beautiful, finished garden design.
There are many more stunning videos of beautifully landscaped gardens using Pavestone landscaping and building materials featured on the Pavestone website for you to explore here.
David Domoney, TV gardener, horticultural expert ,and Pavestone brand ambassador blogs monthly on the Pavestone website on all things landscaping related. We look forward to seeing you back again next month.