Before
After
Leicester & Leicestershire
Same garden, eleven weeks apart. Drag the handle and see what we mean. One team from drawing to final sweep-up, and a fixed price in writing before a spade goes in.
Why people call us
A patio in the wrong corner catches no sun. A lawn that runs to the fence leaves nowhere to sit. We draw the whole garden first, agree it with you, then build it with our own team. No subbies who vanish halfway.
What we do
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Indian sandstone, porcelain and block paving, laid on a full mortar bed with proper falls so it drains away from the house rather than into it.
From £3,400
A drawn plan before anything is dug. Levels, sight lines, where the sun actually falls at four in the afternoon, and what it will all cost.
From £650, refunded against the build
Rotavated, levelled, and laid on a proper root-zone rather than straight onto builders' clay. That is why ours knit in and last.
From £14 per m²
Chosen for your soil and aspect, not for what looked good at the garden centre. Structure that holds up in February, not just July.
From £1,200
Ponds, rills and simple water bowls, with the pumps and liners specified so you are not fishing a filter out every fortnight.
Quoted per garden
The bit that turns a garden you look at into a garden you sit in after eight o'clock. Wired properly by a Part P electrician.
From £2,800How it works
Two hours in the garden. Levels taken, drains found, and an honest word about what your budget will and will not stretch to.
A drawn layout plus a written price broken down by element, so you can cut the pergola and keep the patio if you want.
The loud, muddy part. Muck away, levels formed, bases in. We sheet the house side and jet the drive at the end of every day.
Paving, walls, steps and timber. This is where a garden stops looking like a building site and starts looking like the drawing.
Topsoil, turf, planting and lighting. Then a walk round, a folder of what everything is, and how to look after it.
Recent gardens
Budgets
Nobody puts these numbers on a website, which is why everyone wastes their first three quotes. Here is roughly where the bands sit so you know before you ring round.
A typical semi's back garden brought back into use.
Levels changed, the whole layout reworked. Most of our work sits here.
Larger plots, outbuildings, water and serious structure.
Every figure includes labour, materials, muck away and VAT. The design visit is £650 and comes straight off the build price if you go ahead with us.
About us
I started Sett & Sage in 2011 after years of turning up to fix gardens somebody else had walked away from. We stayed small on purpose: two vans, five of us, and I am on site most days.
That is the whole pitch, really. The person who drew your garden is the person who builds it, and if something is not right you say it to my face rather than to a call centre.
We are not the cheapest quote you will get. We are the one that finishes.
Coverage
What people say
“They drew it, priced it, and then built exactly that. After two builders who both went quiet on us, that was worth every penny.”
Rachel T, Kibworth“Eleven weeks of mud and not one complaint from the neighbours. They jet-washed the road every Friday without being asked.”
Mark H, Oadby“We sit out there until ten at night now. We genuinely did not use the garden before.”
Sam & Jo, QuornQuestions
A tidy reset on a typical semi runs £6,000 to £12,000. A full rebuild with levels changed is usually £15,000 to £30,000, and that is where most of our work sits. Bigger plots with a garden room or water go past £35,000. Every quote is fixed in writing before we start.
The design visit and drawings are £650, and it comes straight off the build price if you go ahead with us. If you take the drawings elsewhere they are yours to keep, no hard feelings.
Four weeks for a reset, eight to eleven for a full rebuild. You get a week-by-week plan at the start so you know when the noisy part ends. We sheet the house side and clean the drive down every evening.
Yes, and it is often the better time to book. Hard landscaping carries on through most of the winter, and planting done in the dormant season establishes far better than anything put in during a July heatwave.
Only for the electrics, which have to be signed off by a Part P electrician. Everything else is our own five. It is the main reason we do not take on more than a handful of gardens at a time.
Hard landscaping carries a two-year guarantee and planting a full season. If a slab lifts or a shrub does not take, we come back and sort it. We are ten minutes away, not a national outfit.
Get in touch
Two hours in your garden, levels taken and an honest word about budget. Send a couple of photos and a rough idea of what you want and we will come back with a date.