GreenTouch Outdoor Advisory

GreenTouch Outdoor Advisory Helping homeowners make better outdoor decisions before they spend money. Backed by 25 years of landscape & horticultural experience across Ireland.

04/10/2026

BULBS IN YOUR LAWNS 🌷

If you’re planting bulbs in your lawn this autumn, stop trying to make them look neat. Straight lines and even spacing will always look man-made.

Instead, take a handful of bulbs, gently toss them across the grass and plant them where they land. Some will naturally cluster together while others will sit further apart, giving you a much more natural display come spring.

And forget wrestling with a bulb planter in thick turf. Cut a small cross in the lawn with your spade, push the spade in behind it and gently lever the turf back. Drop your bulb in at the recommended depth, release the spade and lightly press the turf back down.

One important thing for spring — after the bulbs finish flowering, give the foliage time to die back naturally before mowing over it. That allows the bulbs to store energy for next year.

Quick, simple and hardly any disturbance to your lawn.

Save this for your autumn bulb planting 🌱

Think before you spend and follow for more

01/10/2026

Plant more, w**d less 🌿

It might sound backwards, but planting fewer plants doesn’t always mean less maintenance.
Leaving large gaps in a border creates open ground, and w**ds are usually more than happy to fill it.

You don’t need to plant on the scale of a large public planting scheme. In a home garden, grouping plants in 3s, 5s and 7s can create a much stronger effect, depending on the size of the bed and your budget.

As the plants establish and knit together, you get more colour, more impact and less exposed ground.

Sometimes spending your planting budget properly from the start can save you work later.

Helping homeowners make better outdoor decisions across Ireland.

Think before you spend.

27/09/2026

Garden Feature on a Budget 🌿

You don’t need a huge budget or a complete garden redesign to make an impact.

The trick is to pick one area and spend your budget where it will make the biggest difference.

A small amount of walling could create a raised bed, built-in seating, a BBQ area, feature wall or even a simple water feature.

And if you’ve got basic DIY skills, you can keep the budget down even further by doing some of the work yourself.

These materials can be picked up from RDC Paving in Clondalkin, Dublin.

Think before you spend. Follow for more practical outdoor advice.

25/09/2026

Permeable resin-bound surfaces 💧
A simple way to see how a permeable system actually works.

Water passes through the surface rather than simply running off.

The important bit is that it’s not just about what you see on top. The build-up underneath matters too, and we’ll get into that in another video.

Resin-bound surfacing can work across residential driveways and outdoor areas, as well as larger commercial settings such as apartment developments, hotels and shopping centres.

I’m down at RDC Paving Centre in Clondalkin, Dublin, where they supply resin-bound surfacing and also offer a supply-and-fit service.

Plenty more to come on how these systems actually work.

Think before you spend.

20/09/2026

WHEELCHAIR FRIENDLY GARDEN

We think about wheelchair accessibility in public spaces, but it can sometimes be forgotten when we're designing our own gardens.

On this project, wheelchair access needs to be part of the design from the beginning, without compromising on how the garden looks or how the whole family uses it.

A wide accessible path will lead to a new entertaining area with a bbq, built-in floating bench and a table designed so an electric wheelchair can comfortably fit underneath.

And accessible doesn't mean clinical. We can still bring in plenty of colourful, low-maintenance planting, using the right plants in the right place, while ornamental trees help create shelter in this exposed coastal garden.

The goal is simple: a beautiful, practical outdoor space where everyone can sit, eat, relax and entertain together.

Think before you spend and follow for more.

19/09/2026

SIDE GARDEN ROOM

An unused side garden can have huge potential.

This west-facing space gets plenty of evening sun, so why not turn it into a garden room? A louvred roof, direct access from the house, comfortable seating, heat lamps and warm lighting could create a quiet spot during the day and a cosy outdoor space in the evening.

Sometimes it’s about making better use of the space you already have.
Think before you spend. Follow for more.

18/09/2026

Simple outdoor ideas from Cork City, Ireland.

I popped into Cork City before an outdoor consultation and had a look at this project on St Patrick’s Street, with the planting carried out by

What I really like is how simple the overall idea is.

You’ve got raised planters in a rich red powder-coated finish, with hardwood timber seating incorporated directly into them, and then loads of planting softening what would otherwise be a very hard urban space.

The planting mix is strong too. Hydrangea ‘Limelight’, Nepeta, Salvias, ornamental grasses, silver birch trees and plenty of seasonal colour all working together.

And that’s the bit worth taking away.

You don’t need to copy the scale or the finish. You can take the same thinking and bring it into your own outdoor space, a raised planter, built-in seating, a simple tree canopy and repeated groups of plants.

Sometimes the best garden inspiration doesn’t come from another garden at all.

Look around your towns and cities. There are ideas everywhere.

Think before you spend.

13/09/2026

Replanting This Bed

This planting bed was meant to be low maintenance, but it ended up with too many different plants and no real flow.

We’re stripping it back, keeping the hydrangeas, and simplifying the rest.
Then we’ll repeat a smaller selection of plants like Achillea, ornamental grasses, salvias and nepetas.

Planting in groups of threes and fives gives the whole bed a much stronger visual impact.

Think before you spend.

13/09/2026

While down in West Cork for an on-site consultation near Carriganass Castle, Kealkill, just outside Bantry, I took some time to look beyond the garden itself.

The ground was wet, with heavy clay and rock underneath — but that was only part of the story. Water was also moving down from the surrounding valleys and streams, so understanding where the water was coming from was just as important as looking at the soil.

That won’t be the reason for every wet garden. Flat sites, new builds, compacted ground, poor soil and bad levels can all create drainage problems too.

After 25 years working across Ireland, I’ve seen plenty of different causes.

In gardens, water can be a curse — sometimes we have too much, sometimes too little.

Before installing drainage, understand the why first.

Think before you spend.

12/09/2026

Patio on a Budget

This large patio at the front of the house wasn’t being used because it’s so exposed to the coastal weather and strong sea winds.

So instead of spending more, the plan is to reduce the amount of paving, bring in more grass and planting, and reuse the existing natural stone in a more sheltered part of the garden where people will actually use it.

We’ll also add a couple of large pots with specimen trees to break up the paving and add some colour.

Working with what’s already there can completely change a space — and save thousands.

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Dundrum, Dublin 14
Dublin

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