Hillside Family Garden, Rhu

Connecting House and Landscape

The design for this hillside family garden connects the house to the surrounding landscape and offers ease of access over the steeply sloping ground. Trees and planting soften the building’s appearance and create valuable wildlife habitats. This hillside family garden provides a lower-maintenance, family-friendly space for year-round enjoyment and an important connection to nature.

Creating a Cohesive Family Garden

The design transforms the front and back gardens into one cohesive wrap-around family garden. This layout encourages exploration, movement, and connection throughout the garden, allowing safe and fun year-round access for both children and adults.

Maximising Views and Privacy

Carefully positioned seating areas capture sunlight throughout the day and maximise the views both within the garden and beyond to the firth of Clyde.

As the front part of the garden is exposed to passers-by, a boundary hedge creates privacy and enclosure around the seating areas. Decorative vertical timber posts beside the lower bedroom windows provide additional screening while maintaining openness and allowing natural light into the home.

Enhancing Outdoor Family Living

The design opens up the area outside the conservatory with views onto terraced planting and to the larch timber dining deck that invites the family outside. Wide steps leading to the deck also create informal seating for gatherings and social occasions. A dining deck connects to terraced longer grass and lawn spaces via a more formal gravel path as well as mown paths lined with naturalised bulbs. The pathways lead to a secluded seating area surrounded by tranquil planting as well as a play area for the children.

Terracing the Slopes

The design terraces the steep slopes to improve access and usability. It also creates plenty of space for layered planting that creates a sense of mystery and exploration in the garden. As part of the layered planting, ground cover plants create a living mulch reducing the aftercare demands of the garden.

Designing for Family Life

The garden encourages both active and imaginative play for both adults and children alike, with dedicated dining and seating areas for social gatherings for the whole family.

A dedicated football and basketball area supports active play, whilst the terraces encourage exploration through the garden. At the top of the garden, there is a play area that encourages imaginative play. A dining deck to the rear and a seating patio to the front of the house offer time for the family to come together or for adults to have some me-time.

Overall, this hillside family garden meets the needs of every family member and will do for years to come.