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Planter boxes are a great way to display spring plants, flowers or herbs – outdoors and indoors. Tracy Marsh shows how to make a simple wooden planter box and how to decorate it with two easy finishes. Wooden planter box The basic planter box can then be...
What do you do when you’ve got a pool you don’t want? One Sydney couple’s solution, has been to transform it into a low maintenance pond system which looks terrific. The swimming pool was not being used and the owners found it a chore to maintain....
There are a number of ways colour can be used in the garden to create special effects. This can be achieved in a number of different methods using both foliage colour and flowers in a creative way. Another element is the use of glazed ceramics in the garden....
Australian gardens in the 1950s and 1960s were simple areas of lawn with few interesting plants. These days gardens have become places of fantasy where people create a bit of theatre in the backyard. Australians are amongst the biggest travellers throughout the world...
‘Burke’s Backyard’ has visited many gardens over the years with many different themes. Each garden has reflected the varied interests and fantasies of its owner. Of all the garden styles the one that is almost universally admired is the tropical...
Burke’s Backyard visited an older style house which had been given a new modern look with a Tuscan theme. The outdoor entertaining area had been paved and retaining walls finished in a painted cement render. The original barbecue however looked out of place with...
One of the incredible privileges of living in Australia is being able to watch such a wonderful collection of native birds. The best way to bring them into your backyard is to plant native Australian plants such as grevilleas, banksias or bottlebrush. Another way to...
Small backyards don’t necessarily mean no garden at all. They can be transformed into garden rooms as an extension of the house. One such example of a garden room courtyard was designed by Jim Fogarty. The design The aim was to provide a low maintenance,...
Gardens can take as much of your time and money as you let them, but Burke’s Backyard recently featured an award winning garden developed on a tight budget. Budget gardeners Molly and Neil McCloskey of Corrimal, NSW, have some useful tips on how to garden...
Most of Australia has just emerged from the awful El Nino drought. Our garden plants have suffered badly through this period. So, this is the most important spring in the last 10 years – put in some effort now and the results will be tremendous. The problems:...