Landscaping, gardens and swimming pools

Garden work is seen as the final job because it's the last thing on site, but everything under the garden — pipes, cables, foundations, ground levels — has to be decided before the first load of soil covers it. So the mistakes on this page have a particular character: they don't make the house fall…

• This page contains
• The six-step sequence for external works — steps that must be redone every time they're swapped
• Outdoor concrete isn't the same kind of concrete as indoors
• Garden pipes — testing is in stage 22, but backfilling the trench is here
• Garden lighting and outdoor electrics — the one place in the garden where a mistake can kill
• Irrigation — the pipes must be underground before the turf goes down
• Swimming pools — tell apart what you can inspect yourself and what an engineer must answer
• Retaining walls and garden walls — some count as buildings under the law
• Planting soil and bed drainage — the layer under everything in the garden
• Transplanting large trees — the real cost comes in the first one to two years
• Planting distance from the house, pipes and fences — roots spread much further than the canopy
• Paths and paved areas — they sink because of the base, not the pavers on top
• Fish ponds, fountains and pergolas — attractive features with hidden systems
• Trees and lawns — work whose real cost comes one to two years later