I have just cleared out an area under the house - a small room at the back of the garage that connects to the laundry/come storage room on the other side - a bit hard to explain the layout, but it works perfectly now as a second office/study area that I am using to gather and sort literature for further study. It has a large filing cabinet, desk, sorting table and lots of shelving for pre-sorting piles of literature which I have accumulated so effortlessly over the years! It comes with window views out to the garden and lovely water glimpses (if I open the garage door) and is lovely and cool in summer. While it is well organised and tidy, I have deliberately left it fairly rustic (read 'man cave' like) as I don't want to feel like I need to be 'cleaning and tidying' while I am there. I have a stack of classical and choral music that I play while down there ... in between listening to the cricket in summer, of course! Some great names in here re what to call it .... perhaps my 'She Nook' or 'the Reading Room'

Random would simply make no sense, and randomly placed or selected items would only stand out, jar your impression or just feel wrong. On the other hand, eclectic pieces need to have a sense of style, that is definite enough to take a shared stage amongst other interesting, unique or beautiful things, perhaps in complete opposition to each other. A strong sense of design is needed to build an underlying theme of a room to use eclectic, seemingly uncoordating pieces to go so well together. I doubt there would be a designer who would think eclectic is the same as random. Although, there are people who have a knack in just putting these spaces together without really being able to articulate why it works, in these cases, the client may question the direction, but results speak for themselves. If it works, it doesn't 'just work' as we say, it is generally very well planned and carefully considered to achieve a random thrown together eclectic room. It can be a celebration of quirky, great, clever or unique in style, colour or design. But the principles to build and coordinate are still necessary to make it work. I personally love bookcases and apocothary drawers, because they house many different objects that I admire for different reasons. They may not all go together, but because they are all houses in one element ( ie bookcase) and they seem to contain their personality on their own niche or shelf, making he overall collection 'eclectic'. However, they are just individual groupings of things that have merit. According to me- the 'collector'. Your eye will define what on what grounds something holds merit, and so real eclectic is determined by you, the client, and never really the designer!

@Karen Hodge, I hear you!! Sometimes I think the estate agent should carry quite a bit of the blame actually. If they do their job correctly like you see in the adds on TV, they should bring these discrepancies to the attention of the sellers, stand on their morals and say if you can't get it better than this, then you'll have to find someone else to sell your home!! I know you can't make everybody "house proud" but the saying "do unto others" springs to mind. I bet if these same people bought a house not up to scratch, "a current affair" would hear about it but they don't think it wrong to simply walk out on a house that isn't being left nicely for the next family!! I have some friends that recently sold a house in Essendon, Melb and whilst the buyers were back and forth selling their own home, my friends kept watering the plants and even did things like painted out the wardrobes because of the scuff marks made over time!! They cleaned the entire two storey house from top to bottom and finished by mopping the floors as they were exiting. The buyers were so taken by the entire home, they bought it with almost all the furniture that my friends had in it!!

Kristen, your plan looks good to me. The stepping stones along the long fence are a great feature. The palm in that photo, is it on your side of fence or your neighbour's? Ruth & bigreader have good suggestions re using more of a hedging plant. Both would be striking and afford you some privacy in time. Just check that your soil will agree with whatever you select. I love birds of paradise, but will the giants be enough to give privacy? I like them in small groups best rather than in a line. It's going to be a splendid back garden when you are finished.