Beautiful garden gates and fencing give you more than just privacy.

From a practical perspective, garden gates and fencing give you privacy and protection, keep kids and pets in, and unwanted intruders out. But more than that, they form an essential part of the architecture or your garden. Garden gates can be simple and practical, elegant, impressive or imposing, and come in a wide range of designs and materials including natural timber, wood composite, wrought iron and aluminum. You can have your gates professionally built, but if you’re reasonably handy with a hammer and a drill, you’ll find installing them yourself is a very quick and simple home improvement project.

Tips for installing your garden gates.

We’ve all had the experience of trying to close or open a gate which has jammed because it’s either dragging on the ground or it’s wedged between the support posts. Setting up the posts so that they remain firm and rigid, and don’t sag inward toward the gate involves following a few simple procedures.

Firstly, if you are using timber for the posts, make sure it has been properly treated to resist weathering and rotting. The post material should be thick enough to support the size of the gate; generally narrow gates up to about 4 feet high require 4X4 inch posts, and taller gates up to 6 feet require 5X5 inch posts. A wide gate such as a driveway gate will require 6X6 inch posts. Smaller gates should be concreted into a hole at least 2 feet deep and 1 foot square; larger gates require a larger hole.

A spreader which joins the two gate posts above head height will give added stability. The gate itself should always be braced diagonally to prevent it skewing. To ensure your gate is perfectly rectangular before you hang it, measure the two diagonals to check they are the same.