Buy small plants – and consider a ‘bulb lasagne’: how to give your garden a late-summer glow-up

“It is not always necessary to rip out everything and start again,” says Ella Malt, who runs the gardening company Soil and Soul Norfolk. “It is much more sustainable to work with what you have. You can make such a difference with a bit of cutting back, clearing up leaves, cutting an edge on a lawn. People notice edges: you could spend hours making a herbaceous border perfect but if the edge of that border isn’t crisp, it will automatically look untidy.”

“Never underestimate how much a good tidy will help things,” agrees Glaswegian gardener Colin Stewart, who was at Great Dixter in East Sussex and now works with private clients. “Even just sweeping up dead leaves from paths makes a huge difference. Sharpen up fuzzy edges. Be brutal: if you’ve got plants that are going over, maybe sweet peas which have bolted and look a bit sad, rather than hanging on to them, it is probably best to be ruthless and pull those things out and put in something new – there is still a lot of time before the frosts are coming. Deadheading flowers will help to replenish plants so they can flower again.” Leave anything that could become a seedhead, like Digitalis lutea or verbascums, Stewart says.

Think about boundaries

Giving paving a good sweep and scrub can make an immediate impression. “Even sweeping up dead leaves from paths makes a huge difference,” says Stewart. “Neat paths always make any chaos feel instantly more intentional. If you have really cracked concrete or paving slabs, putting gravel down is a good idea. If you put a thick enough layer down, some plants will self sow into it. It is preferable to decking, which always rots and becomes a hideout for vermin.” And don’t forget to sort out any sad-looking fencing, which can be painted if not replaced: “I go into a lot of gardens that are really let down by boundaries,” says Stewart. “Painting all the fences and walls around the space in the same colour, in a uniform way, makes an astonishing difference and elevates the whole garden.”