7 Steps to creating a planting plan for your garden
A planting plan may seem too much like hard work, after all who doesn’t want to just go shopping, pick your plants and get them in the ground? But it’s so worth taking the time to create a plan on paper for your borders and beds and with a bit of time it’s pretty easy to do.
1. Grab your materials
You’ll need a tape measure, paper, ruler, pencil, rubber, pens and something circular to draw around. This could be a stencil, a drawing compass or some round objects in different sizes. The circles represent different plants on your plan.
2. Measure your beds & borders
Jot down the measurements. Don’t worry, this definitely doesn’t need to be accurate to the centimetre.
3. Check your aspect & know your conditions
Knowing which way your border faces (and whether it’s sunny, shady, dry or damp) is essential to make sure you pick the right plants. Once you’ve determined your aspect and conditions, research your plants and choose what you’re going to include in your plan. Think - right plant, right place! Read more about the 12 steps to a beautiful border here
4. Draw your beds & borders to scale
A scale ruler will help with this, but a normal ruler and squared paper can be just as effective.
5. Plan your planting
Check the size of your plants at maturity. Scale the size and draw the plants onto your plan. Group them in a way that creates visual interest, for example with varying heights or colour contrasts. Then you’ll start to see the scale of the plant against the size of the bed and against other plants. It’s a huge help.
If you’re planting trees or something relatively slow growing, check its size at five years old and use that as a guide for your plan.
6. Colour-code & label your planting plan
So now you know what plants you’ve got where. You might want to think about blooming time and seasonal colours at this point too. If you colour-code your plan, you’ll find this much easier to picture.
7. Go shopping!
Hurrah, time to go get your plants! Because you’ve got your plan you’ll know what to buy, how many to get and exactly where you’re going to plant. It’s a win-win and helps avoid those garden centre impulse buys we all love!
And now you’re all set!
Once you have your planting plan in place, you’ll find you avoid wasting time and money on the wrong plants. You’ll also avoid impulse buys at the garden centre.
Because you’ve got a plan, you’ll know what plants to buy, how many to get and exactly where you’re going to plant them.
It can be so easy to jump right into planting. It’s the exciting bit after all! But a little bit of pondering and planning goes a long way towards creating the garden of your dreams.
Easy planting plan ideas created for you
If you follow the steps I’ve outlined above, you can create a professional-looking planting plan for your own garden. Or if you prefer, I can do it for you!
We can consult on your planting plan virtually or in person. You don’t need to be local to me in Edinburgh to take advantage of my planting plan service.
Katie Townsend Garden Design is a small design studio in Edinburgh.
Working on a broad range of projects from courtyard gardens to small city gardens, and larger spaces, we cover Edinburgh, Glasgow and East and West Lothian. We also offer virtual design services throughout the UK.