When you have a long sloping back garden, access and use can be a real challenge. Especially if the hill drops off right outside your back door. That’s the challenge these homeowners in Bolton faced.
They have a great space at the back of their property, but it slopes almost immediately. It meant limited patio space, and limited areas for entertaining. To get to any sort of flat ground, they had to go down a flight of steep concrete steps – not ideal for guests visiting.
So they called Complete Driveway & Patio designs to see how we could help. And once the owners heard what we could do to create a rear patio outside their back door, they asked us to transform several other areas of their garden.
1. Creating a flat, multi-purpose concrete patio outside the rear extension
Our first big task was to excavate the existing wall and old, ugly concrete steps outside the rear extension. We brought in the mini digger to rip it all down, before backfilling and building a retaining wall.
Set deeper into the garden, this created a much larger, more functional area outside the extension. The perfect, easy access area for entertaining and dining – right outside the extension doors.
The transformation is huge, and included a gorgeous glass balustrade overlooking the garden.
We made sure to wrap the new concrete patio all around the house as well, printed with a Royal Ashlar Slate pattern and coloured a Classic Grey.
2. Building new steps down to the bottom of the garden
Our next part of the project was to rip and re-build new pattern imprinted concrete steps down to the bottom of the garden, to make access to pond and garden room safe and easy – whatever the weather.
These new curved steps – with a London Cobble pattern and classic grey to match the patio – help make the descent much gentler and easier to handle. We even added a hand rail for extra security.
3. Providing all weather access to the pond and garden room
The staircase leads down to the garden pond and a dedicated room that sits at the bottom of the garden. Although there was an existing block paving path here, it was old, worn and slippery during any rain – not great when you’re walking past a pond!
We re-did the entire path from the bottom of the stairs and all around the pond – widening it in places to give the homeowner more space when walking to and from the garden room.
The concrete here was printed with a London Cobble pattern, in our popular Bideford Buff colour, with a mahogany release.
4. Adding a new functional concrete patio outside the bottom garage
For another part of the project, we installed a new concrete area outside the garage on the other side of the garden.
This would give the homeowner even more functional space that could be used all year-round and further transformed the look of the new garden.
5. Installing a new entrance patio in pattern imprinted concrete
Alongside some additional garden paths, we were also asked by the homeowners to create a new small entrance patio, outside their front door. We were more than happy to help.
It added a great new feature to the front of the property – and teases at the total garden transformation that sits at the back.
Needless to say, the homeowners were absolutely thrilled with their new patios, paths and stairs, and how it’s completely opened up access to their garden.