New house and a sloping garden

Hello, I agree with Astitchintime - terracing in some form, with a path for easier access. We moved into a new build with a steeply sloping garden, and paid to have some simple terracing done. Shallow steps were made with sleepers and gravel.
Really pleased with it as it suddenly made planting and maintenance so much easier.
Good luck!

Depending on the size of the sloping plot I would consider terracing it slightly to provide a 'path' so you could stand on level ground to attend to the maintenance

We moved here in 1973. We were young and agile back then and hadn't a clue about gardening.
Our plot is a third of an acre and a large portion is on a very steep Hillside. The soil is thick clay.
After some years of bumbling through planting trees in the wrong place and choosing the wrong plants we decided to let mother nature do her own thing on the steepest part of the garden.
We have lots of self seeded trees at the bottom plus a couple of maple trees we planted 45 years ago.
On the gentler slopes we planted a couple of small apple trees at the top and treated the bank as a meadow which we strim a couple of times a year.
The top of the steepest bank is planted with a variety of shrubs. Hydrangea, camellia, azalea, rhododendron philadelphus, lilac and wisteria which we have trained over supports.
Over the past 10 years or so we have tried to make the garden as low maintenance as possible.
Still have a problem with ivy and brambles and now employ a gardener a couple of hours a fortnight to keep on top of it.

I use flattened out cardboard as a weed suppressant and cover it with wood chippings as a mulch. My gardener lays a barrier of bricks at the edge to help prevent the mulch washing away and once it's wet, it tends to stay put.
I rarely have to use weedkiller but do from time to time if needed.

Most of our garden is banks
We too inherited brambles and ivy one of our banks is called the bank of doom cos it is so steep
If yo have lots of brambles when planting new stuff the brambles will still come up in between

Valerian self seeds and can be just strimmed to keep it tidy likewise Mexican fleabane
If it dries out go for draught tolerant plants and strum in between to keep weeds down
Hope you get there in the end

Thank you both so much. Really helpful, practical advice which is just what I am after.

I'm going to have to think about steps. You're right Casdon, it is very slippery and only a matter of time before we come to grief.

Trailing nasturtiums is genius Lixy, and will save us from a lot of bare soil (and hopefully suppress the weeds) in the short term.

I’ve got a steep slope down one side of my garden, have clay soil, and can tell you what I’ve learned.

Build steps in to the slope at intervals along the bank, otherwise when it’s wet you are likely to slide down and break your ankle, because it’s very slippery (and you will be up there more than twice a year).

Don’t plant tall perennials, they are too needy, they all flop forwards and you need masses of stakes to hold them up.

Bulbs do well because they are strong enough to remain upright - I’d never plant crocosmia again though, it seems to spread down the slope very rapidly, and it’s hard work to dig out.
I also wouldn’t plant a holly again, mine is lovely but suckers come up from the roots, and the roots spread.
Things that have done well for me and are trouble free - spirea, berberis, broom, hydrangeas, dog roses, heathers, perennial geraniums, pulmonaria, cyclamen, achillea, doronicum, geum. For some colour, I also have nigella, aquilegia and snapdragons, with no mulch around them, and they both self seed.

I mulch my bank from the top as the mulch moves down on its own over a few weeks, and I also water at the top, from standing on the lawn below with the hose on sprinkle mode - if you’ve got a deep mulch you won’t need to water much.

We used periwinkle to cover a slope. We used the common blue one and just put in a few plants as it spread and self-rooted really quickly. Since then periwinkles have become available in different forms and I think I'd use the variegated one if doing it again.
We underplanted it with bulbs which gradually naturalised - a variety of narcissi and daffs for the Spring, crocosmia for the Summer and Autumn.
A quick fix for this year might be some trailing/climbing nasturtiums that will give you colour, cover and time to think a bit.