I feel like such a part-timer at the moment. It's weekends and evenings at the moment. Anyway, here is a quick bog garden done over a couple of evenings:
We needed a bit of shade over the pond to help suppress algal growth, so decided on a
gunnera manicata. These grow in damp, boggy conditions, so I dug the hole to suit a piece of spare EPDM pond liner I had. It will soon be filled with hostas, ferns, alums and so on. The pipe (with slits in the sides) leads water direct to the roots of the gunnera.
Anyway, on with the building.
I finished the little steps, bar the stone slabs:
Also the back door steps, and the piers defining the entrance to the garden:
I also finished the coping (soldier course) around the circular patio:
Over to the greenhouse. You may recall my reluctance to build the spine wall any taller until it was braced. Well, I started the plinth walls of the greenhouse, which will secure the main spine wall as it gets taller:
Here's a puzzle for you. See the hole in the second from last of the above photos? In the third course up from the slab? Well. why would I be leaving a hole about 3-1/2" square in a greenhouse wall ? It's not for services.
Back to the patio. I've been concreting over the drains, bit by bit:
Now, the main "show" steps up from the back of the house to the garden level. These are going to be quite dramatic.
For a start, I needed to build a bit of the wall to the right of the RH pier:
Because of all the embankment in the way, I couldn't lay out my big template for this wall. so I made this jig up to transfer the design from one side to the other:
That's a piece of scrap plasterboard. Flip it over, and mark out the wall on the other side of the steps:
Then, I built the bit wall I needed:
Next I set up the central pivot point for these arc steps, and made a quick jig to transfer the first curve to the ground for the foundation:
Now, remember that it's 33 or 34 degrees (93F for you Americans) here at the moment. The ground was baked so hard that I needed a hammer and bolster to cut the edges of this little trench, and a pick to dig it, even though it was only about 3 inches deep. So, blister time:
It took me more than an hour to work out the levels. This is highly complex, with curves meeting curves and the paving laid to fall away from the house. I set a datum peg, and made a gauge rod for the rest of the steps. The gauge will be set on top of the datum peg when checking:
This foundation is mainly above ground, so I had to put up some temporary shoring. That's rather a fancy title for lining up some blocks. Note, too, that I concreted in the drain pipe:
I don't think I'll get back outside until the weekend, but after that, I should be back to building just about full time. You might see the pace of work pick up somewhat.