A quick & dirty guide to perfectly imperfect paving
From one non-expert to anyone who'll listen
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It’s a round-up of everything I know (which is surprisingly more than I thought) about laying aesthetically pleasing, low-pressure, inexpensive garden paths.
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I will be the first to admit that I don’t know very much about paving.
In fact, not only did I admit this the other day on Instagram, I made a reel expressly showcasing my lack of formal education in the area of all things bricklaying. It seems I accidentally worked some kind of reverse psychology witchcraft, however, as I then received a bunch of messages asking if I could, in fact, write a guide to the bricklaying that I had professed to know nothing about.
Why yes, yes I can.
Here is a guide to perfectly imperfect bricklaying. For the layman layer who sees beauty in paths that have ‘quirks’ and might not be, exactly, level.
First, let’s get one thing straight: You don’t need to be highly skilled to make your own garden paths (I am proof of this). If you are happy with paths that aren’t totally perfect you can - and should! - just dive in and give it a go. It’s fun!
Aside from jumping in and giving it a red hot shot, my biggest tip is this: don’t use cement. You don’t really need cement and, if you avoid using it, you have no pressure to be perfect because if you don’t like what you’ve done you can just pull it up and try again (I have done this myself, many times).
What you’ll need
A trowel
A spade
Two bricks (that you’re not using on your paths)
A long piece of string
A spirit level
A piece of wood roughly the length of the width of your path and about 2-3cm thick (so if your paths are gonna be 80cm wide, look for a plank about 80cm wide - this is optional but handy if you have one lying around)
A whole lot of recycled bricks, paving slabs or whatever you want to build your path outta (strong recommend against river stones, I tried this and was slipping around on them for a year before I pulled them all up).
Full disclosure: most of my early paths and garden edges I laid with just a trowel and a spade and eyeballed them until I thought they looked *close enough*. The extras I’m suggesting are helpful if you want your first path to look better than my first path, which is probably a sensible goal.
Do you need builders sand or any other materials? Nahhh. I don’t reckon. If you live in Perth you’re already gardening in sand. If you really want to lay a fancy, very level and perfect path, I guess a few bags of yellow sand will help you, but we’re not talking about perfect paths, are we. These are quick and dirty perfectly imperfect paths, so easy that you cant let excuses, time constraints, overwhelm or a misguided urge for perfection prevent you from giving them a go.
If you’re worried about starting, know this: the cottage garden style definitely, absolutely, does not NEED perfectly laid paths to look beautiful. And Monty Don himself says that all his paths are wonky.
Ok. Here’s how you do it.
Planning and designing your path
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