OUTDOOR LIVING


Sustained efforts


Johanna lidge at arshalls shares her adice for building sustainability into your homes outdoor space to bring life-long benefits


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reating a sustainable home is now a top priority for self-builders, from locally sourced materials to energy


efficiency measures. When it comes to your outdoor space, there’s plenty you can adapt to your design and add in once your initial build is complete. Begin by focusing on what you can source locally. se a good mi of natie and non-natie plants to benefit pollinators, and consider owering times to make sure theres something in ower all year. nsure plant success by choosing the right plants for the soil type and position in the space; your local garden centre can adise if youre unsure. When it comes to planting, you can use


reclaimed building materials instead of topsoil, dierting them from landfills and reducing the need for etra materials. The low nutrient levels in rubble are perfect for growing wildowers leaing some spaces to grow a little more ‘wild’ is great for biodiersity.


Including habitats for wildlife within your garden design is another ecellent way to support biodiersity. Creating piles of stones or logs within planting areas provides shelter for insects and invertebrates, and it’s another opportunity to reuse building waste on your site.


Buildings and pavements absorb


and retain more heat than natural land, affecting health, energy use, biodiversity, water consumption and air uality. Trees and plants can help offset this as they increase the amount of shade and sun protection while also cooling the surrounding areas.


Shaded surfaces under trees can be up to 11-25 °C cooler than unshaded surfaces, making them both useful and attractie.  building with a liing wall or suitable climbing plant growing on it can impact both the outdoor and indoor temperatures, meaning less energy is required to cool inside in the summer or keep it warm in the winter. When it comes to hard landscaping, you should consider permeability as well as selecting British-made or quarried materials. Whateer the material, its often harder for water to soak into


74 www.sbhonline.co.uk


the ground where it lands, leading to oerwhelmed drains and ooding. ou could consider permeable paving or grass paing ags to get around this. Permeable paving looks like regular block paing, but has a defined oint width and material, ensuring water can seep through the oints and reach the ground rather than run off into a drain. Grass paving is similar, but this type of solution forms more of a grid system, where the grass is encouraged to grow through the openings in the block. This has the additional benefits of increasing biodiversity and potentially lowering the temperature around your house on very hot days.


WATER REUSE


Reusing rainwater is an ecellent way to reduce water consumption to benefit the enironment  and your bills. ts generally thought of as collecting the run-off from buildings via the guttering and storing it in tanks, but a simple water butt will do a great ob if youre short of space. or a


stand-out sustainable design feature, you could create a rain bo planter connected to a garden nature pond, with a tap and oerow onto a permeable surface. Greywater is wastewater that comes


from the home. Showers, baths and dishwashers are good sources; depending on use and ‘after-treatment,’ some are suitable for use elsewhere around the home. Water from washing machines and sinks is harder to reuse, and isnt recommended for your garden. Greywater systems come in all shapes, sizes, and leels of compleity, but most have the standard features of storing the water, then a treatment process and a way to get the water to where it’s needed. s greywater contains organic matter, it does need some treatment if you store it for more than a few hours to minimise potential health risks. The most straightforward way to implement a greywater system at home is to collect it from your shower or bath, and then allow it to cool for a few hours, allowing any debris to settle. ou can then use this directly on non-edible plants. sing untreated greywater on fruit or crops is not recommended, and you should never mark it as safe for human consumption. Where looking to store and use greywater for more than a few hours, you should install a more robust system, ideally with treatment.


Johanna Elvidge is head of design at Marshalls


mar/apr 2023


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