How I Created The Garden Of My Dreams.

Hi there and welcome back to my YouTube channel. My name's Ross Lee and this is my garden. I developed the garden over six years ago now. Before moving here I was homeless for roughly 10 years and I got help from a charity to sort my life out and secure housing. So this was my first home and for me I wanted my garden to be a magical place where I could just chill out and unwind. The amazing thing about this garden is that it really does have the power to heal you. It has such a fresh vibe when I walk out there every day and I think because I was homeless it now really is my sanctuary and it's everything I could have ever dreamed for. The first year I moved in here was so exciting. I bought a swimming pool for the back garden and we didn't even get to use it because the summer then turned really cold. So I decided to plant up the the grass that was killed by the pool and then 10 months later all of the plant, all of the grass was removed and there was just loads of plants and it just felt great just to be enveloped by like all this foliage and texture and colour and shape. And now I really do just enjoy having so much fun here and who knew if I never had had that swimming pool I now wouldn't have had this. So I guess I do have to thank the higher power for making it cold that year because now I get to go on holiday in my own garden every year. The biggest question I get asked about the garden is it must be so much maintenance and it really really isn't you guys. Having a lawn is much much more maintenance than having this garden. All I have to do is water, sweep the path, maybe deadhead a few things and cut a few things back here and there but honestly because this garden has been here six years even in this heat wave I've only had to water it once or twice a week. If you're someone who struggles with maintaining time in your week to dedicate to your garden there's other options like irrigation and stuff like that that you can still achieve. Maybe not something with the less plants but still a massive impact on your life and your mental health will improve because you're out there and you're caring for other living things and nature and believe this nature has the power to heal you. This seating area is just a bamboo frame pergola with some bamboo furniture but it really is the plants around it that make it so appealing and this sort of appearance is still doable with just pots. As you saw that last bit, this bit I'm now going to show you, that's all pots in that area and it still looks lush and you know you can move them around play with them. It's so much easier sometimes in pots because you can change how it looks straight away without the back break and work of digging things back out. I have some wisteria planted above this pergola, some star jasmine for a bit of evergreen colour there and it really does help because the wisteria and the star jasmine have great scent and you're really under the leaves of the tetrapanics there too. When creating a garden you want to think of the senses that you're going to feel in that garden, the sound of water, the scent of plants, the textures of plants, so the grasses next to that buddha and they're blown in the wind, they really do help to give a dramatic effect. The biggest thing I can say is just have fun. Goodbye guys.