Writing the design brief
The brief is the contract between the site and the design. Everything from here gets tested against it, and in Phase 11 you will score the finished garden against this document.
Everything in the last four lessons was collection. This one is the write-up.
A design brief is a written statement of what the garden has to do. It is not a design, and the fastest way to write a bad one is to start describing solutions — “a raised limestone garden bed along the western fence” instead of “screening from the neighbour’s second storey, and something that survives afternoon sun on that side”. The first sentence has decided the answer before anyone has stood on the block in February. The second states the problem and leaves the answer open.
You are your own client here, which makes this harder, not easier. A paid designer would push back on half of what you say. Nobody is going to do that for you, so the document has to do it instead.
Why a professional insists on this before drawing
Three reasons, all of them commercial.
It makes quotes comparable. Consumer Protection WA’s advice is to get at least three written quotes and to be clear about exactly what you want done. If three landscapers price three different interpretations of a vague conversation, you are not comparing prices, you are comparing guesses. The brief is what makes them price the same job.
It is the reference point for every variation. Once work starts, “can we just…” is the most expensive phrase on site. A pro measures every change against the signed brief and prices it as a variation. Without the document, scope creep is invisible until the invoice arrives. Contracts and variations covers the mechanics.
It survives you changing your mind. In month five, tired and over budget, you will want to delete the thing that mattered most. The brief written in month one, when you were thinking clearly, is the only argument against that.
A structure you can copy
Ten sections. Write them in this order — the later ones depend on the earlier ones. Aim for two to four pages. If it runs longer than five you are designing, not briefing.
1. The property and what is already there
Address, block size, orientation, and — because you are renovating rather than starting on bare sand — a short inventory of what stays, what goes, and what is undecided. Two lines each on the existing lawn, the retic, the trees, the paving, the fences and the shed. The existing garden audit fills this in properly later; for now, record your intent.
2. Users and uses
Everyone who uses the space and what they do in it. Not “family of four” — how old the kids are now, whether the dog digs, who does the maintenance, whether anyone has mobility limits, and where you actually sit in January versus July.
3. Must-haves, with a reason attached
Each must-have gets a sentence saying what it is for. “Shade over the western end of the alfresco, because it is unusable after 3pm from November to March” is briefable. “Pergola” is not. This is the output of needs, wants and the five-year view.
4. Explicit exclusions
The section most people skip and the one that saves the most money. State plainly what you are not doing: no pool, no water feature, lawn only in the rear north-east corner, no synthetic turf, verge out of scope this stage. Every exclusion you write down is an argument you do not have to have later.
5. Budget and staging
A total number, a contingency percentage, and — if the money will not cover everything — which stage each element sits in and what must be built first so later stages do not require demolition. Use your figures from the money conversation, and note the deposit caps: 10 per cent for most trades, 6.5 per cent for home building work contracts between $7,500 and $500,000.
6. Maintenance you will genuinely sustain
Write hours per month, not adjectives. “Low maintenance” means nothing; “two hours a fortnight, no hedge trimming, no seasonal replanting” is a design constraint. Be honest — this section is the one most likely to be a lie, and the garden will find you out in about eighteen months.
7. Style and materials direction
Three or four reference images and a sentence about what you like in each. Materials you will accept and materials you will not. Water Corporation’s four free Perth garden plans are useful here purely as vocabulary — being able to say “coastal, not cottage” saves a lot of talking.
8. Known constraints
Services, easements, sewer, retaining, dividing fences, overlooking neighbours, strata or covenant conditions, and council rules. Note the ones you have confirmed and the ones you still need to check; Phase 3 and Phase 4 resolve them.
9. Programme
When you want it usable, and any fixed dates. Note that Perth’s planting window is autumn to early winter, so a build finishing in December means either a summer of hand-watering or a planting delay of five months.
10. What failure looks like
Three specific outcomes that would make you regret the project. These are the questions you will answer in reviewing against the brief, so write them so they can be answered yes or no.
The WA lines a generic template will not prompt you for
| Write this into your brief | Because |
|---|---|
| Maximum lawn area, in square metres | Perth allows sprinklers on two rostered days a week, before 9am or after 6pm, with no sprinklers at all from 1 June to 31 August. Lawn area is a water and maintenance decision, not a look. |
| Shade as a functional requirement, by location and time of day | Afternoon western sun is the single biggest determinant of whether Perth outdoor space gets used. Brief it as performance, not as a structure. |
| A soil improvement allowance | On Swan Coastal Plain sand this is a real line item, and it is invisible in the finished garden — which is exactly why it gets cut first. |
| Scheme water, bore, or both | Changes irrigation design, running cost and plant palette. Decide before, not during. |
| Verge in or out of scope | Council rules differ. In Stirling, plants and mulch need no approval but paving, synthetic turf and in-situ concrete need an application approved first. |
| Which zones may be watered and which must survive on rainfall | This becomes your hydrozoning plan in Phase 5. |
Test it before you rely on it
Read it aloud. Anything you cannot say without hedging is not decided yet — mark it open rather than leaving a vague sentence that looks decided.
Then apply the yes/no test to every line: in two years, could someone standing in the garden say whether this was achieved? “A relaxing space” fails. “Seating for six in shade at 4pm in January” passes.
Then hand it to someone who knows how you live. They will find the thing you have been avoiding. That is the point.
What happens to this document next
Phase 3 takes your brief onto the site and finds out which parts of it the ground will actually allow. The constraints and opportunities plan is where the brief meets levels, soil, services and shade — and where some of it gets rewritten.
Keep it in your workbook as a living document, dated. When you change it, change it deliberately and note why.
Do this on your own block
Field journal entry
Your design brief
Write the full brief for your property: who uses the garden and how; the must-haves; the explicit exclusions; the budget and staging; the maintenance level you will realistically sustain; the style direction; and the three things that would make you call the project a failure.
Saved to your workbook
Sign in to write this straight into your project workbook — or just keep it in a notebook.
Checklist
- Cover users, uses, must-haves, exclusions, budget, maintenance and style
- State what you are deliberately NOT doing
- Have someone else read it and tell you what is missing
Watch
Garden Design Basics - The Client Brief
A registered garden designer walking through how he takes and writes a client brief, from a working practice rather than a marketing channel. Worth watching before you write yours because it shows the brief being interrogated — where he pushes back, what he refuses to accept as an answer, and how a vague want gets turned into a testable requirement.
Nottingham, UK. The briefing method transfers directly; every climate, plant, drainage and lawn assumption in it does not. Perth's binding constraints — two rostered watering days, a winter sprinkler switch-off, deep sand and 40-degree February afternoons — have no equivalent in his work and you have to add them yourself.
Where to go deeper
Every link below was fetched and checked before it shipped. Nothing here is a guess.
- Freearticle20 minAustralian
How to navigate the client brief process for garden designers
Ross Uebergang Landscape Design
Why this oneThe closest thing to a working designer's actual briefing method published free in Australia. Uebergang teaches landscape design at Melbourne University's Burnley campus, and this page sets out the five things a brief must cover — scope, services, client wants, style and mood, budget — then gives the question categories underneath each, including stakeholders, allergies, pets, inventory and sustainability. His blunt line that you do not proceed with a client whose budget is unrealistic is the same discipline you need to apply to yourself.
Change this for PerthWritten from Victoria for professional designers taking briefs from paying clients, so some of it is about managing someone else. Read it as the structure a pro would impose on you, then apply it to yourself. Nothing in it is Perth-specific — the climate, soil and water constraints in this lesson are what you add.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- FreetoolOverseas — adapt it
The complete design brief template (free download)
Garden Ninja — Lee Burkhill
Why this oneA genuinely free, genuinely complete brief template from the designer who runs BBC Garden Rescue — twelve questions covering primary purpose, who uses it, must-haves, deal breakers, a maintenance reality check, style, colour, seasonality, budget, site conditions, constraints and future evolution. If you would rather fill in a form than face a blank page, start here and then rewrite it in your own words.
Change this for PerthUK, and it shows. The seasonal and colour questions assume a cool temperate garden with a growing season that runs through summer; in Perth the stress season is January and February, and the question you actually need to answer is what survives six weeks over 35 degrees on two watering days a week. Ignore the plant and lawn assumptions entirely and keep the question structure.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- Freegovernment10 minPerth / WA
Hiring tradespeople
Consumer Protection, Department of Energy, Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety (WA)
Why this oneThe regulator's own page on what a written quote must contain and what you are allowed to be asked for up front. Specific and useful: get at least three quotes, insist the quote lists job description, material costs, labour, timeframe, call-out fees and after-hours rates, confirm whether GST is included, and know the deposit limits — 10 per cent for most trades, 6.5 per cent for home building contracts between $7,500 and $500,000. Your brief is the document that makes three quotes comparable.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- Freearticle15 minPerth / WA
Josh's House — landscape design and plans
Josh Byrne & Associates / Curtin University
Why this oneA worked Perth example of a brief that got built and then measured. The page and its downloadable Landscape Features Plan show how a set of stated requirements — native front garden and verge, a shared central space with no dividing fence, a 25-metre espaliered fruit line on the southern fence, vegetable production, kids' play, outdoor cooking, private courtyards — resolve into an actual plan. Read it as an example of the specificity a brief needs before anyone draws anything.
Change this for PerthHilton, in Fremantle, on a subdivided lot with two houses — so the shared-space logic will not transfer to a standard single block. The value is in the level of detail, not the layout.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- Freegovernment20 minPerth / WA
Garden designs for Perth and the South West
Water Corporation
Why this oneFour downloadable, free garden plans — native, coastal, Mediterranean and cottage — each with a birds-eye layout, a materials shopping list and full plant lists with botanical names. Useful at brief stage for exactly one purpose: naming your style direction in language a landscaper will recognise, and sanity-checking that the look you want is achievable on a Perth water allowance before you write it into the brief.
Change this for PerthThese are stock plans for small, fairly regular spaces, not designs for your block. Do not treat them as a concept — they are a vocabulary.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- FreedirectoryPerth / WA
Find a waterwise specialist
Water Corporation
Why this oneSearch by postcode for businesses endorsed under Water Corporation's waterwise programs, including the Waterwise Landscaper and Garden Design and Waterwise Garden Irrigator streams. Endorsement is not a quality guarantee, but it does mean the business has been through water-efficiency training — which is the single most relevant credential in a Perth garden. Use it to build the shortlist your brief will be sent to.
Change this for PerthEndorsement covers water efficiency, not construction quality, licensing or solvency. You still need references, a licence check for any regulated work, and three written quotes.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
- Freegovernment10 minPerth / WA
Streets, verges, crossovers and traffic
City of Stirling
Why this oneA concrete example of the council rule that catches people out at brief stage. Stirling lets you put lawn, plants or organic mulch on your verge with no approval at all, but paving, synthetic turf and in-situ concrete need an approved verge treatment application first — and verges the owner has modified with irrigation or hard treatments are excluded from the City's own maintenance program. That is the shape of the question you need to answer before you write the verge into or out of your scope.
Change this for PerthStirling only. Every Perth council writes its own verge policy and they differ on height limits, permitted materials and whether synthetic turf is allowed at all. Find your own council's page before you rely on any of it.
Link checked 2 Aug 2026
The rules, with sources
WA regulation changes. Each point below names its primary source and the date it was last checked — always confirm with your own council before you build.
Perth and Mandurah households can use sprinklers on two rostered days a week, before 9am or after 6pm. Garden bore users are on the same roster as scheme users.
Be Groundwater Wise, Department of Water and Environmental Regulation ↗ · checked 2 Aug 2026
The Winter Sprinkler Switch-off runs from 1 June to 31 August each year, applying to both scheme and bore users in Perth and the South West.
Water Corporation ↗ · checked 2 Aug 2026
Deposits are capped at 10 per cent of the total price for most trade work, and at 6.5 per cent for home building work contracts valued between $7,500 and $500,000.
Consumer Protection WA ↗ · checked 2 Aug 2026
In the City of Stirling, lawn, plants and organic mulch can be installed on a verge without prior approval, but paving, synthetic turf and in-situ concrete require an approved verge treatment application before work starts.
City of Stirling ↗ · checked 2 Aug 2026