How to disguise pond liner

Nobody likes VPL! Visible Pond Liner.

The common idea of pond construction is to use flat 'crazy paving' slabs on the top edge of the pond.

You've seen them, with their slightly overlapping edges, desperately trying to hide any signs of liner. Fail!

There are several easy and effective ways to disguise an ugly pond liner. Either using rock and cobbles or plants and even upturned turf.

This series of videos will show you how.

Creating a series of stepped shelves within the pond allows you to layer stone work up and out of the water.

If you start from deep enough in the pond, any uncovered liner will be almost unnoticeable at depth.

You can of course cover the entire bottom of the pond with gravel, cobbles and stone. If that's the sort of effect you are trying to achieve. I think of this type of pond as more a stream bed or quarry pond. In a garden situation this style of pond can work well.

It is a rare thing to find a natural pond that is rock lined. If you think about it, most ponds are the result of poorly drained land and are therefore not much more than depressions in a saturated soil.

As shown in the How to build a wildlife pond page, returning soil into the pond and adding plants at all depths within the substrate will disguise the liner more than adequately. As well as that it looks much more natural than a paved or rock surrounded pond. This style of natural planted pond edge allows you to blend the margins of the pond seamlessly with surrounding borders and lawns.