Building a garden path has been on my mind lately. A LOT. With our studio finished, and soon our backyard deck will be complete, I’ve been dreaming of building a beautiful garden full of hydrangea bushes and a butterfly garden. And yes, it will most definitely have a garden path. Not only do we need a walkway between the house and studio, let’s face it – they can be gorgeous. So I thought I’d share my tips on how we planned out our garden path (which is still in the process and hopefully I can share it later this year.)
Organizing a Garden Path
Figuring out a good flow for your garden is the first step. Where do you want your path, and what parts of the garden do you want to accentuate with a path. These are questions you should ask before you get to constructing your garden path. I find that sketching it out helps you to visualize what will go where. (although this is an artist render, mine looked more like a kindergartener did it.) Once you have these down you can move along.
Make Your Own Stones
If you have left over concrete from another project you can make your own stepping stones. You can pick up some molds from the dollar store in all kinds of different shapes. Home improvement stores also carry many different molds. If you’re feeling super artsy you can grab some dye to change the color of your stepping stones. If you don’t have any concrete and you don’t want to buy some, you can also use old logs. Just cut the log so you have multiple round pieces that you can put in the ground. The wood looks great and will hold up with the weather.
Decoration
This part has everything to do with your own tastes. You can have all kinds of different decorations throughout your path, whether it’s gnomes or fairy lights. It’s totally up to you! Here are just a few of my favorites: Bird bath, garden gnomes, solar lights, sun dial. Come up with some new ideas or feel free to use mine! Make the path your own and you’ll enjoy it for years to come.
Add Areas With Purpose
When planning your garden areas, try to find at least a little space in there to create some purpose. Maybe you want to plant certain flowers to attract butterflies. Or maybe you’re looking to appeal to birds. Planting herbs in a flower garden might seem odd, but rosemary is a beautiful plant – as are many others. If you find some spots to bring in purpose, it will be rewarding on a higher level.
Involve the Family
I’ve seen some really neat paths where the whole family gets involved. Where the kids have one section to decorate (or choose what goes where, at least). Have your spouse and the kids join in the fun. More ideas and more heads are better than one! You never know what kind of crazy ideas they’ll dream up!
If you follow some simple steps for creating your own garden path, you’ll have something great to show for it and you can enjoy it for many years. Thanks for checking out my post about building your own garden path! How do you have your garden path decorated? If you have some great ideas for building a garden path, please, leave them down in the comments. Let’s trade ideas! Let me know if you use any of these ideas! I want to see what you all create!
We are thinking about building our own little garden path and one of the highlights would be to create a little gnome house on one side and a little fairy garden on the other side. The family has been scouting for some of the finds in flea stores where you can sometimes get the most unusual. It will take time to build but for now, we are working to get a path done that would take us to the back of the house. Thanks for sharing Gina!