natural shading by plants

So I also find it very chic and wouldn’t be so "fussy" about the "dirt" if you choose trees that don’t necessarily drop fruit or shed a lot of leaves in some way. But a perhaps more practical solution could be a pergola/frame that you cover with vines, for example. That also saves space, because as nordanney correctly pointed out, you definitely need a lot of space there. You can then complement something like that with a sun sail/umbrella.

I don’t, just occasionally sweep through and that’s fine. You gain a lot of quality of life with little extra effort. Calling fallen leaves and blossoms "dirt" sounds pretty unnatural.

well, if you want to put a table and chairs there and then everything is full of dirt every day, you don’t feel like cleaning that much every day, especially the bird droppings make everything dirty.

Best regards
Sabine

Bird droppings are not so great, but also not a big problem with plane trees, they are quite dense. You can see it one way or the other. A few leaves don't hurt. Actually, that's what we appreciate so much on vacation in southern France, the connection between elegance and nonchalance. Constant cleaning never achieves that. Everyone is different after all.

We have now made a decision. There will be shading from Japanese maple trees around the wooden deck (marked in red). The slope or dense planting in the south will be removed, as well as this seating block at the wooden deck. The tree crowns do not need to overlap, so the trees do not have to be planted close together like in the picture.

That will definitely look great.

I think that’s great! We will definitely shade our pergola naturally as well. On the one hand, we already have a larger plum tree there (provided it doesn’t die from dryness soon, it doesn’t look very good), on the other hand, I want to shade it with climbing roses. Trees are of course also a great solution for more shading, with the tree a large part of the light shade is already taken care of for us. It’s no comparison to a louvered roof and the rustling of the leaves can’t be replaced by anything.