Garden Edging | Lawn Edging | Garden Bed Edging

We sell edging and nothing else, so this is the short version of what we have learned: what each material is good at, where it is the wrong choice, and how to fit it so it is still straight in five years.

What garden edging actually does

A vertical barrier sunk into the ground between two areas. It stops grass runners crossing into a bed, holds mulch and gravel where you put them, and gives you a defined line to mow to. That last one is why people who fit it once do the rest of the garden the following spring.

Which material

Flexible recycled plastic is the cheapest per metre, bends to a curve by hand, and pegs in with a mallet without a proper trench. Corrugated metal is a ribbed steel profile with hemmed edges, for a more textured, agricultural look. Black and stainless steel give a thin, hard line that almost disappears against grass, at the cost of more work to install. Corten is the design led choice: it weathers to an orange brown patina and then stabilises.

We would rather be straight about the trade offs. Plastic in full sun eventually fades and stiffens. Steel needs a spade line cut first and is heavier to handle. Corten sheds rust while it weathers, which can mark pale paving next to it. None of that makes any of them a bad product, but it should decide which one you buy.

What height to use

A 5 cm face keeps grass out of a flat bed. Go to 10 cm where there is a mulch layer or a change of level to hold back, and 20 cm where it is doing real retaining work. The deeper the face, the more it holds and the more digging it wants.

Working out how many metres

Measure along the line the edging will follow, going round every curve, rather than straight across the bed. Those two numbers are different and the straight one is always short. A hose laid along the route and then measured is the easiest way to do it. Add a little for cuts.

Then order that many metres. We cut the per metre ranges to your length, there is no minimum, and nothing is wasted on an offcut.

Fitting it

This is a DIY job with ordinary tools. Cut a clean vertical line with a square spade, seat the edging against that face with the top about 50 mm above soil, drive the spikes through the tabs with a rubber mallet, then backfill and firm the soil against both sides with your heel.

Peg roughly every 1.2 m on a straight run and every 300 mm on a curve. Under pegging a curve is the single most common reason edging pulls itself flat over a season. Butt joins tightly and peg either side, because a gap at a join is where grass gets back through.

The tiring part is the kneeling and the mallet work, which is why we also sell a rubber mallet, a kneeling pad and gloves.

Where people use it

Flower and shrub beds are the most common reason people come to us, followed by mulch and gravel areas. After that: path and driveway edges, tree circles, vegetable beds, and separating a lawn from a patio.

Questions before you order

If you are not sure which material suits your ground, or how many metres a curved bed needs, ask before you buy. It is a short email and a great deal easier than sending back a cut length. You can reach us at theteam@lawnedge.eu.com.