Create a Border in your Lawn

If you have a lawn than is looking a little worse for wear around the edges, you can create a border easily and cheaply by just adding your imagination. Most lawns in the UK are just "there".  By adding some definitive edges your once boring "grassed area", can become an excellent piece of modern looking garden art.

By creating an edge with the tools outlined in this guide, not only will your garden look more appealing, but will actually save you time maintaining it.  There are obviously many different ways of doing this, but I am going to focus on possibly the cheapest way, and the way that will require the least amount of effort.

We are going to show you how you can turn your lawn from this:

Before After

 

The tools required for this are:

[p72292724] Lawn Edging Spade

The lawn edging spade is specifically designed for edging your lawn.  The half moon shape and sharp blade makes cutting into your lawn extremely easy.  The bent metal along the straight edge allows your foot to give excellent all over pressure without it digging (lol @ digging!) into the sole of your feet.
[p104507227] Plastic Lawn Edging

This stuff is great, and extremely cheap!  The lawn edging will stop any further grass growth, and will allow you to create curvy corners with ease.

 

Step 1

Take a look at your lawn, if its meets a different material such as gravel (like the image) without any form of divider, then your going to eventually have a problem. The grass will have no boundary and will eventually create an uneven edge making it not look its best.  These are the areas we need to treat to some edging!

Step 2

Next, we need to mark out our new cutting edge.  This edge is going to be our new lawn line, and needs to be straight.  Using anything like:

  • Measuring Ruler
  • Piece of string (tied from one of the lawn to the other nice and tight)

Step 3

Using the Lawn Edging Spade, follow the straight edge cutting deeply and removing any turf that is cut away.

Step 4

Now you should have a lovely clean edge with the soil showing where you have removed the excess soil.

Step 5

Now, unroll your plastic lawn edging and place against the cut lawn.  Make sure the lawn edging is level with the grass so that the mower will not cut it to shreds.  Once you have the lawn edging in place, put some soil the opposite side to the lawn and press in firmly.  This will keep the lawn edging in place - if your going to creating a nice gravelled border, leave around 1"-2" gap at the top of the edging so the gravel site on top of the soil.

Completion

If you have followed the guide above, then you should have something that looks like the image below. 

Known Problems & Questions

  1. The lawnmower keeps catching the plastic lawn edging?

    Your lawn edging is too high! You can either a) try and push the edging down more to create a flat transition between the lawn edging and the grass or b) Remove excess lawn edging using some sharp scissors
     

  2. The lawn edging has cracked in the ice?

    Unfortunately, plastic does degrade over time.  You can either replace the lawn edging strips with some fresh edging, or use a more permanent edging like concrete plinths, or block paving bricks.
     

  3. How can I make curvy corners?

    Ok, the concept is still the same, but to create a nice curvy corner, you can use some string and a tent peg.
     

    1. Tie 1 end of the string to the tent peg and place in the lawn.
    2. With the other end, tie a can of grass spray paint (the spray comes out of the top of the can, rather than the top/side) at the desired length of the curve
    3. With the string taut, walk around spraying the ground (like a pair of compasses)
    4. This will create a perfect circle.