Hanging house in the Southwest Palatinate - Our House Construction 2.0

I would definitely reinforce the terrace slope as a first step. Unfortunately, slopes are an expensive undertaking. We are building across the slope, and our property also rises towards the back. We received a first offer from the landscaping gardener last week, and I was left speechless, especially the stairs hit hard. We now have to rethink how to approach this. However, we will definitely have the terrain modeled and reinforced in a first step, so that no heavy equipment will be needed afterwards.

It's just a question of how you secure the terraces. I find those concrete blocks that everyone is currently putting in their gardens extremely ugly. :/ In our case, the slope doesn't lead to a lower garden level either, but the property basically ends just behind the slope area. I find that makes it even more difficult. So far, I think the idea of garden bed terraces is the best. But there are also a thousand design options for that, and I don't dare to install it myself. You would have to hire a landscape gardener, but I'm afraid that would also blow the budget.

I find these concrete blocks that everyone is currently putting in their gardens extremely ugly. :/

Me too. And they really aren’t cheap either, especially considering that due to their weight, it usually only makes sense to have a professional place them with an excavator. Compared to that, wooden beams like those are much better suited for DIY work. However, durable wood also costs quite a bit. In the end, you’re always making a trade-off between usable space and price. Simply grading the slope is also an option, but it costs you a lot of space. Plus, maintaining steep slopes isn’t much fun, even if you only go over them with the brush cutter twice a year. I have two more questions on the topic: - Are DIY efforts basically out of the question for you here, or only if you put more work into it? - How is the access for heavy equipment? What kind of route is there beside the house?

The L-stones were the cheapest solution in our offer, no comparison to other walls, piers, etc. Although cheap is relative… We initially considered dividing the slope into 2 terraces. But after it was said that drainage and water runoff, etc. must be considered and that this ultimately means more effort again, it will probably be just a slope with a grading and only one retaining wall at the bottom.

Me too. And they’re really not cheap either, especially considering that due to their weight, the only real option is to have them installed by a professional using an excavator. Compared to that, wooden beams like those are much better suited for DIY work. But correspondingly durable wood also costs money.
In the end, you’re always making a trade-off between usable space and price. Simply grading the slope is also possible, but it costs a lot of space. Plus, maintaining steep slopes is no fun, even if you only go over them twice a year with the brush cutter.

Grading the slope was also what our builder suggested. We have plenty of space for the garden, so I wouldn’t mind losing some terrain to the back too much. However, there would still be a certain steepness left if you also consider the terrace, which is about 4 meters deep.
Therefore, he currently recommended two hillside terraces, which so far have withstood every heavy rain (and we’ve had a few apocalyptic rainfalls this year). But they’re not exactly easy to manage as is. At least a staircase and some borders would have to be planned so you can move between the plants.

I still have two questions on this topic:
- Are DIY efforts basically out of the question for you here, or only if you don’t put more work into learning about it?
- How is the access for heavy machinery? What can you get past next to the house?

Currently, you can still get everything past next to the house. Between the end of the house and the boundary point it’s about 12 meters, and it slopes down diagonally but not too steeply. At first, we might even just leave it like that and sow grass over it. That side of the property won’t be invested in money-wise for at least a few years. This is what it looks like beside the house, only currently a bit smoother and less muddy (the picture is older):


DIY is a competency problem for us again.
We did a bit ourselves with the first house. What we’re good at is creating beds and planting things. I also made a bed edging with embedded clinker bricks that I was quite proud of.
Our self-seeded lawn turned out more bad than good, but it was green – that would be enough for me here at first as well.
Where it quickly stops is anything where you have to get things perfectly straight, like with a plumb line and guide string and such, or when it comes to concreting. Last time I read into it but didn’t dare to do it myself and had someone come do it. It was for a fence, specifically the posts.
I’d like to try building a small wall one day, but maybe first for a raised bed or something. I’ve never done it before. I wouldn’t trust my first masonry attempts to secure a slope.
So all in all: DIY looks rather poor, since we don’t know much. :) In addition to the lack of experience, there’s also a good portion of clumsiness. After we moved here, I tried assembling our bed. 12 screws, and after the third I managed to hit my head with the battery pack of the cordless screwdriver and got a cut on my forehead, the scar is still visible. Since then, I’ve been a bit more careful with what I dare to take on.

The question is how to secure the terraces. I find those concrete blocks that everyone currently puts in their gardens extremely ugly. :/

In our case, the slope does not lead to a lower garden level, but the property basically ends just behind the slope area. I think that makes it even more difficult. So far, I like the idea of bed terraces best. But there are 1000 design options, and I don't dare to install it myself either. You would really have to hire a landscaper, but I fear that would also blow the budget.

The idea of bed terraces is also great. You can do that well on your own. Go for it. If it’s not perfectly straight in the garden, that’s not a big deal. But don’t use wood in the soil area, it will rot over time. If you like, buy granite stones, you can get them cheaply via classified ads.