Aluminium Garden FurnitureGarden Furniture Design

Although outdoor furnishings can be put on any kind of patio, or even in the middle of the garden itself, decking makes a lovely addition to most patios, bringing out the best in your garden furnitue. For this reason, I have decided to provide some important pointers for those people considering making their own decking. The best of people – those who do it themselves!

For starters, make sure the frame is perfect – it is the integral part of the decking! Before you build it, figure out which way the boards are going to run so that you can build the main joints of the frame in the opposite direction, for added support and strength. Although frames can be easily built directly onto the patio, many people like to put bricks beneath the decking to add height – probably so they can feel like they are Lords over people without decking…

If you are going to use bricks to boost you decking and self esteem, remember to use enough to support the whole deck – not just the corners! If you want a guideline for how many to use, I’d go with “as many as you possibly can”. A spring in your step is about the last thing you want when carrying cocktails across your new decking!

As a final point – make certain to screw the frame together. I know nails are infinitely manlier, but screws work a lot better and will hold the timber together for years. Did I mention you should be using timber for the decking? No? That’s because it should be obvious.

That’s all for now my dears.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll sometimes find it hard to choose between the classical age and the times we live in now. Normally the classical age wins; but sometimes there are things these modern times offer that are sufficient to draw me away from my Hellenic-inclinations. Garden furniture is one of those things.

My natural choice in garden furniture is to go bold and strong; stone tables with high-backed wooden chairs or marble stools – furniture on which you can feast and hold court! Simple, flat designs that withstand pounding fists and the slamming-down of tankards – that’s the furniture for me!

However, as I get older I am often struck with the simple beauty of many pieces of modern aluminium garden furniture. Gone are the days when metal furnishings were limited to super-shiny angular tables and thin, tube-legged and uncomfortable chairs; modern metal furniture can truly bring an element of class to a garden, without feeling like an unwanted man-made impingement of nature.

By shopping around and doing some research before you buy, you can make sure your furniture compliments your garden rather than intrudes into it.

When most people think of garden furniture, I imagine they think of a classic table-and-chairs arrangement, be it plastic, wood or aluminium. I expect a parasol features as well – or umbrella as it should really be known in this country, since we all know it’s not the sun we’re trying to shelter from! Ironically, I suppose sun-loungers would also spring to mind – those longer-looking chairs that are either stored vertically in the shed or sit on the patio collecting mould all year….

However, I wonder how many people consider putting something like an armchair literally into the garden… I don’t necessarily mean putting a chair amongst the flowers but, where most garden furniture sits on a patio, there is something immersive about putting a single chair in the middle of the garden – surrounding yourself with nature, if you will. Now I admit, most garden chairs are cheap, plastic things that almost certainly do not help the “at-one-ness” of the situation, no matter how much nature you surround yourself with. This is why I thought I’d suggest looking into buying a nicer chair, more suited to allowing you to enjoy your garden. For example, these little numbers:

Naturally reclined, low-set and made of a lovely wood, these chairs are a much better way to enjoy your garden than a nasty plastic thing plonked amongst the shrubbery!

We’ve all heard of putting furniture in the garden – it’s a very popular thing to do! Whether you’re sitting outside in the evenings with a glass of wine, crashing back for a BBQ or just basking in the sun (if you’re lucky enough to have some), furniture in the garden is the ideal way to let you enjoy the garden.

But how about furniture that is literally made from the garden? Like this trendy wheelbarrow-seat, literally part made with a lawn! Not only would it make a bizarre and interesting ornament in any garden, but it also allows for that “sunbathing on the grass” feel, without actually having to lie horizontally on the ground – perfect for the aged!

If that’s not your kind of thing, or you fear it would be too selfish; try the log-bench! Cunningly made by attaching backs-of-seats to, well, a log! I imagine two of them on either side of a long feasting table for a Mad Hatter’s Tea Party!

Garden furniture in the most literal sense of the term – good idea, or taking things too far?

I know it’s the last thing you want to hear, but the start of September heralds the end of summer and the inevitable start of Autumn.  It may not feel like we have even had a summer, but apparently our alloted sunshine for the year has almost been used up!  People with iron or untreated wooden garden furniture should probably consider packing it up and storing it away for the Autumn – those with plastic or aluminium furniture can safely leave it outside as the bad weather closes in.  In fact, when winter rolls around high-quality garden furniture can actually become quite a feature in an otherwise desolate garden;

Most importantly of all – get out there and have a BBQ!  Time is running out; there won’t be many more nice evenings this year, so bust out the garden furniture, grab some sausages and put the last of the charcoal to good use!