A bowls green is bought as a set of lines, not as a lawn. The rink width, the ditch envelope, the bank height and the marker positions are all fixed by the rules before anyone chooses a carpet. Ask for a price before that set-out exists and the answer can only be a guess.
A lawn bowls green artificial grass specification therefore starts at the green edge and works inward. We build turf rolls on our line, so we read a set-out the way a contractor does. The footprint decides the rink count, the rink count decides the roll width, and the ditch and bank decide the edges.
Why a Bowls Green Starts With the Lines
The set-out comes first because a bowls green is a regulated playing surface, not a landscaped one. World Bowls sets the length of play between 31 m and 40 m. Its standards apply to the complete installation, including surface, base, sub-base, sub-grade and drainage.
A rectangular green can be as narrow as 8 m for a single rink, or wider than 60 m, and it is played in one direction only. None of that is decided by the carpet. The carpet is sized to the lines, which is why a lawn bowls green artificial grass order cannot be priced before the set-out is drawn.
Everything downstream, from the rink count to the seam plan, follows from those fixed lines. Once the geometry is set, the surface sits inside our wider range of sports turf systems. Start with the footprint, then size the carpet to it.
The Green Footprint: Size and Shape
The government dimensions guide sets the length in the direction of play at not less than 31 m and no more than 40 m. The green is normally square, and it is normally divided into six rinks, so six games can run at the same time.
That footprint spans a wide band in practice. One contractor lists a square green at 34 m to 40 m a side, an area of roughly 1,000 to 1,600 sq m. That footprint carries 4 to 6 rinks. An older guide keeps the green at 30 m to 40 m square and caps a rectangle at 44 yards on the long side.
For a lawn bowls green artificial grass plan, the rink count is the number that matters. Take a 40 m square and lay rinks at the 5.8 m upper width. Six rinks take 34.8 m, which leaves about 5.2 m for margins and side ditches. Six is the answer at the upper width, not at the lower one.
Rink Width, Rink Count and the 5 m Rule
Rink width is the number no turf page on the search results will give you. The government guide puts it at not less than 4.3 m and not more than 5.8 m. It recommends about 5 m, so a green never needs re-striping for competition.
The standards body defines a rink as a division of the green normally not more than 5.80 m wide or less than 4.30 m. Indoor play raises the floor, with a minimum rink width of 4.6 m indoors against 4.3 m outdoors.
Every rink is numbered, and the centre of each one is marked on the bank at both ends by a peg, disc or similar device that carries the rink number. For a lawn bowls green artificial grass layout, that numbering is what fixes the seam plan later.
Ditch Width and Depth for the Green
The ditch is the one part of a bowls green sized by rule rather than by drainage design. The government guide sets it between 200 mm and 380 mm wide and between 50 mm and 200 mm deep.
Inside that envelope the ditch needs a holding surface free from obstacles, made of a material