The driveway has been a bit of a mess since the dwarf wall was removed and the driveway sloped down to meet the pavement.   This is how it was originally:

With the setts and edgings done I can put some gravel on top to make it look pretty.  A couple of tonnes of MOT stone were spread out during the freakishly hot weather in July.  It will be topped in gravel once the MOT has been flattened and whacked down.

The driveway will be temporary as I would like to build the garage at a lower ground level, but that will be a good couple of years away.

3 tonnes of gravel later and the front of the house looks much nicer.  I ought to find somewhere to hide the concrete mixing board to give the illusion of tidy.

A while ago the builders next door dug a trench around our house to make the exterior ground level lower than interior floor level.  Previously there was a French drain but that didn’t work, so the plan is to leave the trench open and cover with a grating.

A cast iron grating would be lovely but the quote was £5,000.  I went for a fibreglass grating that looks much the same from a company called Fibregrid.   It looks excellent.

The grating is supported on one side by the retaining wall.  I didn’t want to bolt it to the house wall on the other side for fear of trapping water.  Instead it is supported on stainless steel tubes screwed to stainless threaded rod which might eventually be resin fixed into the concrete base.

My bricklaying is getting better.  The edging is quarter brick on end.

With the edging in I can fill up the hole behind the retaining wall.  This will make it much less risky to exit via the kitchen door.   Only the driveway to gravel now.

A lot of this work will be adjusted in a couple of years time when the garage is built at a much lower ground level. It’s nice to be able to practice. (Edit from future me – ground levels are just fine when you have a trench and I like the brickwork.)