The majority of backyards are a summer set-up that is utilized approximately ten weekends in a year. The furniture is delivered in May, when they sit in a few humid months when no one would want to be outside anyway, and it is returned under a tarp half a month in October. That is what the money usually invested in one would buy.

The strange aspect is that it is seldom caused by weather. Even evenings in April, September and even November are comfortable enough. The most common missing things are shelter, a source of heat, and light which are three solvable issues.

The Shoulder Seasons Are Where the Time Is

To have a yard work in January is not the goal. Hunting the outskirts of the season is a truth, and those are more days than one thinks.

Think about the last week of April. Sixty degrees, breezy, still light at eight. Or the second week of October, arguably the best outdoor weather of the year, which gets almost entirely wasted because the cushions are already put away. The extra six weeks on each side of summer more or less doubles the amount of the backyard usage and is a fraction of the price of the original patio.

The obstacles that are in the way are clear and minute. Wind, That sixty seems like fifty. Damp furniture. Dark at seven. No one lingers in the outside world long enough to realize that he was comfortable.

Shelter First, Then Heat

Shelter does not just do what the heat does, which baffles people who think that a fire pit will be the solution.

A concrete roof over part of the sitting area to the advantage of use time, is more than anything to be done. Rain ceases to earn the invitation to go indoors, morning dew ceases to wet the cushions and midday sun in July ceases to drive everybody out of the patio. A pergola either looks nice or does a lot of nothing unless it is actually covered in.

The variable that is underestimated is wind. A partial screen on the side in the breeze, be it a wall, or a row of evergreens, or a slatted panel, alters the coziness of a room as much as half a thousand dollars of heating appliances. It is well worth watching which way the cold evening air is blowing before anything is built.

Next is heat. The open fire pit is communal and can be used during shoulder seasons but it warms only one side of an individual. An integrated fireplace retains heat better and provides a focal point to a space. The overhead radiant heaters are the viable option in a roof, as they heat objects and people, as opposed to air that gets blown away. Here, whatever, is little done, in a bare, windy yard, and here, then, lies the reason why the order is so.

Planning It as One Thing

Backyard outdoor living services exist largely because these elements fail when they get bought piecemeal. One year a patio, then a fire feature, then a pergola and none of these are related to each other or the flow of the sun and the wind over the property.

Sequencing is the real value in professional planning. Gas lines, electrical, drainage all desire to be installed in the ground prior to the surface going down, and teaching someone to add a gas line to a functioning patio is a rather costly lesson. So is finding that the fire pit is smack in the middle of the wind of the dining table or that the pergola covers the seating area in June and does little or nothing in September when the sun has shifted.

Even in a project which is to be constructed in phases over a few years of time, the entire plan will be drawn once, and as a result every phase will land where it is supposed to. Mostly that is just a question of putting the thinking in a proper sequence and not spending more.

Design for the View From Inside

A backyard is one that is gazed at and not used half the year. That should be given a better design consideration than what happens.

Look out of the kitchen sink in February. When all that can be seen is naked boughs of deciduous trees and a covered grill, the yard dies off five months. Evergreen structure is set in stone so are the ornamental grasses left standing in winter, the plants of interlacing bark and all with berries.

The same work is done by Hardscape. A stone wall or a good bench or a fire feature is purposeful in all seasons but a bed spectacular in June is mulch in January. Lighting does not go amiss here either. One uplight upon a tree, by a warm kitchen, on a dark afternoon, works a lot four months of the year.

Light Is the Cheapest Upgrade

Anything that puts usable hours to the test justifies itself sooner than anything that makes a place prettier and lighting is the least costly type of such.

Enough is path lighting to and from the house, a warm and low light around the seating area and one or two accent fixtures directed at a tree or a wall. Temperature of the warm color is more relevant than the number of the fixtures. A patio is turned into a parking lot by the cool white light, and dimmers are worth the slight additional cost each time.

Be Honest About Maintenance

Each of the features introduced is also something to maintain and features that require effort beyond the capability of the owner will go to waste by becoming clutter.

Water features should be tended to. Gas fire features require minimal. Removable cushions of furniture must have a place handy to store them, or the cushions will be left on and destroyed. A deck box that is accessible to the seating with arms length to put cushions away and not.

The objective is a yard that would be ready to use within twenty minutes. Whatever needs to be set up gets utilized significantly less than that which is ready.

When done right, none of this appears fussy. It has a place to sit on during a rain, a place to take the chill out of an evening, a place to read by light after the sun goes down, and a scene to enjoy upon the kitchen window in the heart of winter. That is a yard that is utilized most of the year rather than ten of them weekends.