Free garden planning tools

Five free tools to plan your garden through the year

Five free tools from our Surbiton garden design team. Start with the sun, check your soil and choose your colours. Then see what to do each month and build your own planting calendar. They all work on your phone and need no sign-up. To see what the soil reader can uncover, read three Surbiton soil stories.

Garden sun planner

Tell it which way your garden faces and the month. It shows where sun and shade fall, then suggests where to put the patio, what to plant and what to check about your soil.

Good for: anyone deciding where to put a patio, a seat or a new border.

About 3 minutes · 6 quick questions

Open the sun planner

What type is my soil?

Find out what soil sits under your garden and what it means for your lawn and your plants. Three quick tests in the garden give you a soil reading and plants that will thrive in it. You can also see the history we have dug up for your road.

Good for: new gardens, a recent move, or plants that keep failing.

About 5 minutes · 6 short steps

Find your soil type

Palette planner

Pick the colours you love and any plants you must keep. You get a named colour scheme, our designer’s view of it and a planting list sized to your garden.

Good for: refreshing a tired border or planting a new garden from scratch.

About 2 minutes · 5 short steps

Open the palette planner

Your gardening year

See what to sow, plant, prune and enjoy each month. Slide through the year, read our advice and add plants to your own planting calendar.

Good for: anyone who wants to keep on top of the garden through the seasons, whatever their experience.

No questions to answer · Opens at this month

See this month in the garden

Your planting calendar

Choose your plants, or start from an idea such as spring bulbs or a shady corner. You get a month-by-month list of what to buy, sow, plant and look after, with jobs to tick off.

Good for: first-time gardeners and keen ones who want a plan for their own plants.

5 short steps · Print it or add it to your calendar

Build my planting calendar

How they work together

  1. Find your lightThe sun planner shows which parts of your garden are sunny and which stay in shade.
  2. Read your soilThe What type is my soil? tool tells you whether you are on clay, sand or gravel, and what that means for planting.
  3. Choose your coloursThe palette planner turns your favourite colours into plants that suit your light and soil.
  4. Plan your yearYour gardening year shows what to do each month. Then build your planting calendar from the plants you have chosen.
  5. Talk it throughSend us your results. Craig or Eli will check your soil, levels and boundaries on a free visit.

Also useful

Garden colour schemesTwelve palettes from real gardens we have planted, with the plants behind each one. Garden orientation guideWhat north, south, east and west-facing gardens need, and the plants that thrive in each.

Want a designer to look at it with you?

The planners are a good start, but they can’t dig a test hole, or see your trees or neighbours’ walls. We can. Free design consultations across Kingston, Surbiton, Richmond and Surrey.

Book a free consultation

© 2026 Flourish Landscaping (CED Consulting Ltd). These tools, their wording and their data are protected by copyright and database right. Free to use for your own garden; please don’t copy it. Terms of use.