After what feels like 2 and a half years of concrete skies, the sun is FINALLY rearing its head. Once we’ve adjusted after initially recoiling, pale skinned with a hiss like Nosferatu, you might find yourself looking outside and thinking ‘you know what, I’d like to start doing a spot of gardening…but I just CAN’T BE BOTHERED.’ Well, as luck would have it, there’s a gardening style for that. It’s called ‘Lazy Gardening.’

Also known as Low Maintenance Gardening, it’s an approach to gardening that focuses on minimising the amount of time, resources, and overall effort it takes to garden.

Some might scowl at the word lazy, thinking this is beneath them, but I like to think of it as working smarter rather than working harder, while still reaping the many benefits.

‘But what ARE the benefits?’ I hear you shout from your sun lounger. I’m glad you asked.

Think of all the OTHER activities you could take up by adopting Lazy Gardening techniques. You could finally start that amateur magicians course you always wanted to do AND come back to a bunch of glorious rhododendrons.

By adopting Lazy Gardening you’ll be doing your bit for sustainability, making you an everyday hero that future generations will worship. A low maintenance garden uses less water, chemicals, and energy to run, which is great for the environment.

In the words of Nicolas Cage when he’s being tortured in The Wicker Man, ‘AHHH!!! THE BEES!!!’ Bees may have done incredible damage to Nic Cage’s face, but they do wonders for the environment. Building a garden that hosts a variety of plants attracts different wildlife, which helps give the ecosystem a nice healthy boost.

Traditional gardening can be stressful. It's like having a bunch of high maintenance kids that constantly need feeding, watering, and changing. That’s just parenting. You can end up spinning so many plates that you forget to appreciate the beauty you’ve helped grow. Whereas Lazy Gardening is more relaxed, all you have to do is plant, let nature do the work, then sit back and revel in the beauty around you. ‘That is one damn fine carrot I’ve grown.’

With less things to do and fewer products used, Lazy Gardening can save you money that you can then spend on a glittery waistcoat to wear during your new magician course.

Sold? Excellent. Sit back and relax (not that I’d expect you to be doing anything else, you lazy son of a gun), and allow me to regale you with some Lazy Gardening techniques.

These go hand-in-hand with Lazy Gardening. They suppress weeds, retain moisture, and regulate soil temperature, meaning less watering and weeding for you. All you have to do is lay them around your plants. THAT’S IT. They keep your garden neat, are easy to use, are eco-friendly, and, of course, low maintenance. You can get a variety from B&Q.

These have a water reservoir at the bottom, meaning plants get the moisture they need without constant watering. They’re great for the soil and come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Self-watering planters are the best friend to gardeners who want to ‘set and forget’.

To be clear, this does not mean bury your partner. It’s important for me to specify that, I cannot go through another court case.

Companion planting is smart work; by growing plants together that benefit each other you can reduce pests and enhance natural, non-chemical growth.

Simple but effective and great to avoid debilitating back pain. Elevated beds minimise the need for heavy digging, provide brilliant drainage, reduce soil compaction, and warm up more quickly in spring, extending the growing season.

These are a Lazy Gardener’s best friend because they come back year after year with minimal replanting. They don’t need much watering, plus, they’re pretty.

Now, if you find that getting out the door is a stretch, you’re agoraphobic, or you just don’t want to risk bumping into your nosy neighbours but you’d still like a little green in your life, then fear not.

Why not try some lazy INDOOR plants? Indoor plants are great for boosting your mood and cleaning the air. But if you’re someone who only has to look at a plant for it to perish, then here are some lazy indoor plants for you that are very hard to kill.

Also known as ‘mother-in-law’s tongue’ as it frequently makes passive aggressive comments about when you last hoovered, snake plants produce oxygen and improve sleep quality. They need minimal water, minimal light, and are basically kill proof, as most mothers-in-law are.

Corn plants only need a small bit of water once a week to keep them happy. These lovely, low maintenance beauties will also purify your air for you. They also grow slowly, so you shouldn’t have to repot them for a few years.

These cool characters are great for hanging in your bathroom because they thrive in humidity. All they ask of you to stay alive is to water them once a week, and in exchange they’ll remove carbon dioxide from the air, helping keep you alive.

Great if you’re a forgetful soul because succulents need the least amount of water of any indoor plant. They’re the thugs of the indoor plant world, so tough that you can drop them, shattering the entire plant, then just replant the leaves in a little soil. Like James Bond, they never really die.

These ones are great for eliminating toxins from your home. All you need to do to keep them alive is give them an occasional spritz of water on the leaves and wipe with a cloth every few months.

And for the truly lazy, actual rubber plants need even less.