Patios Made Simple Read - 5 tips on how to improve your outdoor seating area

1. Clean up! Patio slabs can get really mucky, more than you’d realise. Give the patio a blast with a pressure washer and you’ll realise how clean it can be! It will also shift most of the debris that gets stuck between the slabs, so it can be easily swept away. Pressure washers can be inexpensive, or alternatively they are available to hire, or you could borrow a friend’s. Check out this one from B&Q: https://www.diy.com/departments/pressure-washer-1400-w/1581255_BQ.prd
 
2. Put on a fresh coat! Old faded wooden seats, benches and swing seats can make the whole area look tired too, so get a tin of varnish or even some nice bright outdoor wood paint, and paint your old seats to give them a new lease of life.

 
3. Keep it green! Pot some evergreen plants to pop on your patio. This will keep it looking full of life all year round, and also evergreen plants are often easy to look after. Junipers, boxwoods and Bosnian pine trees thrive in containers and are really hardy so will last all winter.

 
4. Turn up the heat! A chimenea or firepit is a wonderful addition to a patio. You can then make use of the patio on cool summer nights and the cold winter months – and you could even toast some marshmallows! Check out this traditional clay chimenea: https://www.diy.com/departments/blooma-diogo-cast-iron-steel-chiminea/1829825_BQ.prd
 
5. Cover up! Invest in garden covers for your outdoor furniture. This will protect them from getting battered by the weather, and prevent them getting covered in dirt and bird poo, so you won’t have to clean them every time you want to sit outside. Argos has a good selection here at very reasonable prices:https://www.argos.co.uk/browse/home-and-garden/garden-furniture/garden-furniture-covers-and-cushions/c:29395/type:furniture-covers/