It will take you one weekend to update your outdoor living space if you want to use it for entertainment purposes. You can include a stone patio in the backyard or garden to create an easy outdoor room. If the surface is hard, the patio furniture gets a firm footing. Therefore, you can quite easily incorporate a seating ensemble that can cater to outdoor dining. You can have your morning coffee there or simply spend a cool time with your friends.
If you want to build a DIY patio, you will need sand, gravel, and any patio material of your choice. If you want to create attractive and sturdy stone patio designs, all you have to do is use bricks, flagstones, or pavers. When you are planning a DIY patio project, try to opt for a pattern for which you won’t need to cut the patio material. Below are some details you need to know to upgrade your backyard with a DIY patio.
What Do You Need to Build a Patio?
To build a patio, you need a spade, a garden hose and mason line, a plate compactor, a wheelbarrow, landscape fabric, limestone or gravel paver base, leveling sand, PVC pipe, cut according to how long the patio is, a 2x4 board, pavers, bricks and flagstones, plastic edging, polymeric jointing sand, and broom. Now get acquainted with the steps you should follow to build a patio.
Outline the Patio and Remove Sod
Either put a garden hose on the ground or utilize stakes and mason lines when you need to define the shape of the patio. If you haven’t decided what’s the best size for the new space, you can build a comparatively larger patio than what you were planning. Working on an existing patio and making it larger is simpler than starting to build a larger patio from scratch. You can buy a garden spade shovel from Home Depot for $32.
Use it to remove the sod and soil at the place you are planning to build the patio. Dig 8-inch plus the thickness of the brick, paver, or flagstone into the soil. Every 4 feet create a one-inch drop. After you remove all the sod, you can use a tamper to compact all the dirt. With the help of a wheelbarrow to carry the excess soil to a low spot present inside the yard or even a compost pile.
Add Landscape Fabric to the Base of the Patio
Landscape fabric will cost you something in the ballpark of $13 from Home Depot. Line the excavated area with that. Though it’s not something essential, adding landscape fabric helps prevent the growth of weeds between the stones and the patio. Landscape fabric won’t cut a hole in your pocket. Also, installing landscape fabric is easy. Therefore, this particular method of controlling weed is helpful.
The Base of Sand and Gravel
After excavating up to a particular depth, add limestone or gravel paver base and spread it to create a layer 6 inches deep over the patio space. In case you are using a limestone paver base, a garden hose is important as it can wet the material to a certain extent. If you are using a gravel paver base, you can use a plate compactor so that there can be a smooth surface for the patio. In the case of a limestone paver base, the finishing needs to be done with leveling sand.
Lay two PVC pipes one inch across the length of the patio. The pipes should be cut to size so that you can fit them within the base of the patio. Then, spread leveling sand up to an inch. Next, place your 2x4 across the PVC pipes and push the sand across the pipes to make level. After that, remove the PVC pipes and fill the gaps with sand.
Place Stones in the DIY Patio
Lay the first pavers or flagstones from one side of the patio. Place sand underneath the stone as required to create a surface that’s nearly level with it. Place the stones close to each other as much as possible. If you keep gaps between the stones, weeds will germinate easily. As a result, the nature of the patio surface will be uneven.
After you complete the above steps, cover the top of the patio with sand and maintain your DIY patio.