Some questions - is that your front garden, what direction does it face and where you live as all these have a factor in design.

Its the front garden, believe its west facing as sun doesnt reach it until the early evening, the ground is quite boggy. Its a bit strange the grass goes up to the road, no pavement, all ideas greatly appreciated! Oh and i live in scotland

What are the dimensions of the area, does it slope and what are the soil conditions. Oh and as this looks like it is new build area are there any rules or regulation on what you can grow? Where are you in Scotland please.

Not measured it yet but will do, soil is very boggy, central scotland and i didnt realise there could be any restrictions!! Better dig out title deeds?!? :-) the garden is uneven and slopes slightly towards the house, think id need to build a wee wall to level it all off but that sounds too expensive

My neighbour has ocd disorder so i dont want plants that are too messy! Love cherry blossom trees but that would traumatise her and shes so nice, dont want to upset her:-)

What I would do is get rid of all the grass. Fill the area with pale pea gravel then plant a dozen or so buxus balls of different sizes. This is difficult to picture but it will give year round colour and interest and relatively care free and gives good curb appeal.

If you want a small cherry have a look at Prunus Amanagawa, (its branches grow upwards rather than outwards which means you would be able to plant nearer the road than with a tree that spreads out a lot) andyou could plant it on the side furthest away from your neighbour. I don't know how it would go on with very boggy ground or not much sun though. Sometimes if you stand on shaded ground you will find that the sun shines on your upper body long before it reaches the ground, in which case a tall thin tree might be the best bet. You might be stuck with choosing between planting bog lovers or draining the site.

In view of your neighbour's condition, I would broadly go with Kildermornie's suggestion, with low growing plants, but also add winter flowering heather, which will loves the damp, and occasional sequestered iron feeds. The low growing pernettya (white, pink, purple berries during winter as above) could also provide some easy evergreen maintenance with winter colour. For the summer/spring ... a few clumps of multi-coloured heuchera, purple leafed berberis with the yellow flowers (name escapes me, but easy to maintain and prune into shapes after flowering). Bomb-proof day lillies could also provide some brightness in the summer, before the heathers flower, and in the spring some crocus and daffodil in clumps here and there. If you stage it to come through the pea gravel, you could have year round interest.

Thanks everyone, thats a lot of ideas, will get to work soon and will post some pics

Pernettya looks lovely

It needs acid soil to succeed as do summer flowering heathers so test your soil before buying. (pH metre cheap from garden centre will do the job)

And slugs love the berries of pernettya which you may find under the name of gaultheria now as the botanists have renamed - again!

Gaultheria?! They are just trying to confuse us ... thank you for the update Moon growe.

It used to be gaultheria then they changed to pernettya then they changed back to gaultheria... grrr. I've seen them being sold under both names in GCs.