Returning home, you wonder how Christie did with the new plantings in your front yard while you were on vacation.
You are startled as you approach your house. It looks so different! The holly hedge that used to cover your house is gone. You can see the front door. Now you can see it will look good painted bright red. Geraniums in some new pots will look great in the summer. Christmas trees with lights in the winter.
You wonder “which plant that is with the yellow green leaf? Maybe that's the one that blooms in the summer.?” The ferns are huge. They must be 2 feet tall.
Christie was right. You don't need many plantings along the front of your house. It looks cleaner and light.
You'll have to have them take a look at your back yard jungle this spring. You wonder what they could do with that.
Before & After
Sometimes new Landscape Design Ideas are can come from viewing before and after comparisons of other projects. Here are a few favorites
Japanese Garden
This is an example of a yard that we stepped into and had a hard time thinking clearly it was so overgrown with a jungle of old and multiple boxwoods, liriope, random slate and azaleas.
We decided to shape the Japanese garden she wanted around her inventory. We dug out all of the liriope and sprayed the roots before and after the installation to catch any hangers-on. The full healthy English boxwoods were left in place. We wove the pebble path and berm through the ones we left standing. The random slate buried under the lirope in the before shot, was used on top of the gravel path around the berm. Hostas and hellebores were transplanted from the chaos and used closer to the new Asian terrace. Quite a difference! The client was great and really thrilled.
Winding Rose Bed
This west end home was covered about a third of the way up with Japanese hollies. The clients had been so unhappy for years, but didn’t know what to do. We cut the rose bed through the middle of the lawn to take off the predictable square shape most gardens installed by their builders have. It was full sun exposure, so we used plants that could handle and thrive in relentless sun. You can see variegated foliage of yellow/green and red. Less obvious in this shot are the bloom colors of white limelight hydrangeas, blue plumbago, and later in the season, pink sedum.
I went by last month and it looks great after a year!
North Side Slope
Their north side garden was completely revamped. The stairs you see in the ‘after’ shot were located around the corner of this slope and were completely dilapidated. We took the old stairs apart, used the original stone and then supplemented with newer stone. The pedestals for pots on either side of the lowest step, are my favorite part! The client needed to add her touch for the type of pot she wanted there.
We also built a low retaining wall that you could sit on, to hold the severe slope. The client’s buried random slate was reused (as well as our donation of a few) for the walkway through to the back. Woodland perennials will grow and fill the whole space in a few years.
Woodland Make Over
The front bed in the 4th picture had the asphalt driveway coming right up to huge, dark, half dead hollies crowding the house. We extended the bed out a few feet and laid a cobblestone edge along the driveway edge in a simple curve.
Strategic placements of boulders, chosen specifically for this spot, were added for accents. Whenever we use boulders we try to use them as if they were pulled out of a nearby creek, before the house and garden were built.
Woodland plants were used around the stairway to the front door, with a quirky blue spruce for the focal point. Power washing the house helped clean up the façade. The space is light and cheerful as dapples sunlight breaks through the high canopy of trees.
