Garden planning

[Chriselle 158]

I'm getting more used to the idea that if we want something to a certain quality, it'll cost around that. Coming up with the money and deciding to do it is a different matter!

 

Both companies showed me the breakdown, and I can see how it all adds up both in terms of materials and people's time.

 

One thing I know for sure, I do not want 'blocks' in my garden - fence or otherwise. Nice bricks ('baked bricks'?) please, not horrid cheapo 'blocks'. Yuck.

 

Railroad ties....

[NoFakie 45]

Bare blockwork is ugly, but blockwork that is rendered looks really good. In terms of look, I think it gives you more options than brick.

 

How much do they want to charge you for trees Dumbstick and how big are they?

[DumbStick 13]

The cool guy did not actually give us pricing on trees and flowers yet. Which was fine.

 

By rendered do you mean something like ガーデン　ジョリパット

 

This kind of thing

 

 

I believe that is blocks but covered in all sorts of colours etc. Yes, not seeing the 'blocks' is definitely an option!

[snowdude 44]

Interesting about the grass hibernating in winter.

Will have to ask locally people in the know for this atea about what grass is good here if we decide to do grass. Might go for stones amd grass so we have somewhere solid to walk on when wet.

 

 

[DumbStick 13]

Problem is, if you (as in me too!) don't have grass, what do you do? Have it all paved?

Doesn't seem particularly exciting and there's already enough concrete paving here.

I like the idea of a path round the outside flowerbeds and a higgledypiggledy stepping stone like path over the grass to a bench in one corner. Original plans had just a bit too much grass I think.

[Thundercat 60]

Just remember, if you get grass it means you have to cut grass too!

[DumbStick 13]

Almost word for word what my Dad said.

 

[NoFakie 45]

The cool guy did not actually give us pricing on trees and flowers yet. Which was fine.

 

By rendered do you mean something like ガーデン　ジョリパット

 

This kind of thing

 

 

I believe that is blocks but covered in all sorts of colours etc. Yes, not seeing the 'blocks' is definitely an option!

 

Yeah, that's one example. They call such things "renders" in books and on home improvement tv shows, I guess because some of them are not/do not contain "plaster". You can shape the blocks, lay them in curves, and cut out holes or incorporate glass blocks, or even the siding of your house if it looks good. This means that every breeze block/cinder block wall you see near someones house could look like the above without that much cost or effort. Probably less cost than the satnav in that home owners' car. You can buy some renders premixed for easy DIY.

 

One way to hard landscape is to lay concrete, stamp it with a mould into tile shapes, and paint the "tiles". It looks way better than it sounds and is used in high spec commercial builds. It's how all them "outlet mall" shopping centers are done, like at Gotemba and Toki.

 

 

Obviously you'd use that for a patio and cut out beds and other features, maybe a posh gravel zone like the wall photo above, not your whole garden (!)

[DumbStick 13]

Got it.

 

I think I need to learn more about that particular way of doing things.

[DumbStick 13]

OK been spending time today looking at that lot. Interesting. Oh so many things you can do.

 

In the meantime, I got a quote from the third guy yesterday. I thought he'd come up with something simple and cheap. While it wasn't very complicated, it came with the price tag coming in at over 5 million. Er, no, I don't think so!

 

We're down to the one company I think, they are still being very responsive while I ask questions. I realise numbers will rise from the original one due to my requests, but I just hope we can keep the costs in control.

[DumbStick 13]

Looking at bricks. Lots of different ones. The one the guy had in initial idea was called 'bake brick' - basically they are made of concrete I think. He said because of cost, as it's less expensive that other bricks.

 

Can't help feeling it looks a bit... false, theme-park-y....somehow, and liking more traditional looking majime bricks more, even though they add to the cost (of course!)

 

 

What you reckon, or am I just being silly?

[griller 9]

Got anything to compare with DumbStick?

[DumbStick 13]

Was just looking, something like this

 

[Tubby Beaver 209]

I like that real brick best......the other one is fine in a cutesy cartoonish sort of way, but actual bricks are cooler

[BagOfCrisps 24]

I agree.

[NoFakie 45]

The best of both worlds, cost and looks, would be tiles made of sliced regular clay bricks. I'm pretty sure my brother's house in Scotland is timber frame and the brick looking parts are only tiled with sliced brick. Using tile means they can use far more insulation that a normal cavity brick wall. Building the house with a frame instead of load-bearing walls also has advantages. Sliced brick is identical to brick, with I guess the main downside being you'd have to do both sides for a garden wall.

 

Here's some on sale in Japan.

 

http://item.rakuten....-liebe/slb-004/

 

Note that 11,000 a square meter is about three times the cost of using the cheapest (real) stone tile. It's about double the price of granite and 50% more than marble (!) All for the humble brick, originally a super cheap material, the breeze block of its day.

 

As for non clay brick tiles, I guess the good ones might look good, but the not so good ones will look uber naff.

[muikabochi 208]

I prefer the second lot. The first ones do look slightly... pretend.

[pie-eater 207]

Go with the real bricks dude.

 

We'll pay the difference.

[DumbStick 13]

Thanks pie-eater!

 

[DumbStick 13]

He's coming to have a look over our place tomorrow and once he has done that will give us a detailed quote.

 

I think we have pretty much decided on using this company, but I won't tell him that of course yet. Really appreciate how much time he is prepared to give us though without needing any kind of commitment.

[DumbStick 13]

Is it difficult to plant trees - for example a 1.5m conifer?

 

I'm just a bit depressed today at hearing costs mount up - lots of them not for the tree but the cost of planting which seemed well out of order to me.

[NoFakie 45]

We haven't planted any conifers but I reckon you could carry something that height very easily. One in each arm probably. Maybe only 1,000 yen each to buy. The biggest tree we planted ourselves was a maple that was about 2.3m but with a 12cm diameter trunk at chest height. The rootball on that was about 70cm across.

 

With conifers, I guess you want cultivated varieties that have low maximum heights. One of the most common ones in the UK, a crossbred cypress (hinoki) called a leylandii, has caused hundreds of disputes due to them growing very quickly and shading out neighbours' gardens. They hit 10m in no time.

 

 

On the garden plan we had done, the guy wanted 50,000 plus for each tree. In the end, we just got him to dig some holes.

[Hokkaidough 4]

[DumbStick 13]

 

Great photo!

 

I was thinking more ones that we can keep to 2m max.

 

He was mentioning less than 5000 yen for the tree itself, but 'maybe' a man per tree for planting it. Now I still know next to nothing but that seems mad to me. I'm sure I can learn and get that bit done myself.

 

The guy seems to be getting the message that while I want a nice garden and perhaps willing to pay for it, I'm not interested in any silly business and want to crunch the costs as much as possible. Hopefully his costings will reflect that.

[big-will 7]

Are there no laws against people doing that?!