A sloping garden, although it may be an attractive, natural-looking feature of your property, can be hard work to keep in good order. You’ll probably find it tiresome to work on, especially if you have to carry heavy tools and equipment such as the lawnmower to the top.

You can, however, landscape the shape of the bank into a series of flat terraces, connected by steps which not only offer easier access when gardening but also give you greater flexibility in planning your planting arrangements.

But you needn’t only alter the shape of a sloping plot, it’s also possible to re-style a flat, featureless site by building a raised flower-bed, lawn or patio. By digging out areas of your garden you can even create sunken features.

However you design your new scheme you’ll have to incorporate in it a solid, load-bearing barrier called a retaining wall, which must be strong enough to support your remodelled earth and prevent the soil from spilling onto the lower level

Planning a retaining wall

The scale of your wall largely depends on the amount of earth it’s to retain and the steepness of the bank. But if it’s to be over about 1 2m (4ft) high, you should consult your local authority. They may demand that you include some form of safety measures for the structure or that you adhere to certain building standards, especially if it’s part of a boundary wall, where it could affect public access.

Start planning by sketching out your landscaping ideas, and try to keep your terraced or sunken features in scale with the rest of the garden. If you simply want to border a shallow sunken patio or path, for instance, or create a raised lawn or flower-bed in a level garden, you could build a fairly low wall, 300 or 600mm (1 or 2ft) high, and lay flat coping stones on top to use as informal seating, or as a display for garden ornaments or plants in containers.

A gradual sloping site with two or more terraces will allow you more scope for varied planing than a single, high ‘platform’ would, and also forms a much stronger structure because there’s less weight bearing on the individual walls.

Where you’re building a flight of steps in a bank to connect your terraces, you may need to include ‘stepped’ retaining walls at each side to stop the earth from spilling onto the treads

When you’re remodelling your ground don’t forget to set aside any topsoil and re-use it for any new planting beds. The remaining areas that you excavate for foundations must be well consolidated or compacted, then levelled, on a layer or hardcore, so that they’re firm enough for normal traffic without danger of subsiding.

Laying the foundations

The prime requirement for your wall, whatever building material you use, is to build it on adequate foundations set below the frost line.

In effect, your foundations should be a cast concrete strip or raff foundation the length of the wall and about twice its width. For example, for a typical 225mm (9in) thick brick wall 1 2m (4ft) high, built on clay soil, you’ll have to lay your concrete 500mm (20in) wide and 150mm (6in) thick. Set the entire foundation in a trench about 500mm (20in) below soil level. In very loose soil you¡¯ll have to increase the width of the strip, or build a key which projects down at the toe, or outer edge of the foundation, to help prevent the wall sliding forwards under pressure from the retained earth.

Supporting the excavated earth

Where you’re building your earth retaining wall in a steep bank, or in loosely-packed earth, you might have to construct a type of ‘dam’ from temporary timber struts and braces to shore up a series of vertical boards or planks called shuttering. This should be laid directly against the face of the soil to hold it in place while you can dig and lay your concrete strip foundations and build your wall.

On very high walls you might find it easiest to build the shuttering in stages as you excavate the site. You should leave about 300 to 600mm (1 to 2ft) between your proposed retaining wall and the face of the shuttering to allow you plenty of access when laying foundations and building the wall.

Once the foundations have been laid and you’ve completed the lower courses of bricks or blocks you should start to lay your drainage pipes. Set some actually in the wall, draining to the front, and lay others at the back of the wall, set in gravel or hardcore, to drain the sides.

Continue to build the wall in the normal way and, when it’s completed, and you’ve pointed the joints, you should leave the structure for at least 24 hours to set before removing the shuttering.

Back-fill the wall with well-compacted soil or a porous filling and top the wall with concrete or brick copings to complete the structure.

to lay your drainage pipes. Set some actually in the wall, draining to the front, and lay others at the back of the wall, set in gravel or hardcore, to drain the sides.

Continue to build the wall in the normal way and, when it’s completed, and you’ve pointed the joints, you should leav