bedroom window and which one will sneak your pup a treat when they’re outside. You know where the sun beats down on late summer afternoons — perfect for an herb garden — and where the neighbor’s oak tree casts a cool pool of shade for those patio cookouts that you can’t wait to indulge in.
As you begin to get an idea of where the best places are for all the things on your wish list, stroll around and figure out the routes that will get you and others from one area to the next. As you begin fiddling with potential pathways, you may discover that they can make your garden seem bigger. Obscured by shrubs, ornamental grasses, or other tall plants, paths can double back, twist and turn, and run along for much longer than you may think in a limited space. (Chapter 7 is chock-full of information on designing and building pathways.)
Focusing on privacy
Even if your neighbors aren’t the busybody type, you may still find relief in building in privacy as you create your landscape plan. (Chapters 12 and 20 have ideas, including plant suggestions, for creating privacy.)
Here are some good ways to enclose and protect your yard or parts of it:
Tall hedges (see Chapter 12), and arbors (flip to Chapter 10) work wonders at making your yard your own space.
Trees are a natural for providing privacy, though if you install new ones, you’ll either have to invest in bigger, more expensive specimens or be patient. See Chapter 11 for all sorts of options and ideas.
Walls, fences, and even privacy screens help to keep your noise in and other noise out — so that you don’t have to keep shushing your kids or resenting the neighbor’s kid with his noisy car. (Turn to Chapter 6.)
Privacy structures define the boundaries of your landscape. Imagine decorating your living room if it had no walls. A little tricky to make it feel cozy, isn’t it? Outdoor living rooms work the same way. Walls make the furnishings — in this case, the plants and ornaments — look better by providing a backdrop. Put that dream fountain you invested in against a wall of lush greenery, and it becomes much more appealing than if the sidewalk, street, or a neighbor’s yard forms the backdrop.
Knowing when you’ll use your landscape
When dreaming up your ideal landscape, take into account the times of day and the times of year in which you plan to use your yard. For example:
If you plan to be outdoors in the late afternoon, figure out where you’ll be most comfortable at that time of day. Maybe the shady spot under the big tree out back. If the sun shines hot where a patio is or may be, consider installing an overhead structure for shade or planting shade trees.
If you want to use the garden (or view the garden) at night, investigate and install well-chosen lighting (see Chapter 10).
If you still want to be outdoors during the rainy season, investigate creating a covered patio.
If bugs populate the yard at the same time that you do (summer evenings), a screened-in porch or patio will keep them at bay.
If you want to get outdoors early in the spring or well into autumn, keep or plant trees and structures that don’t block the sun.
If you enjoy every minute of summer outdoors, choose trees, shrubs, and flowers that bloom throughout the season (refer to Part 3).
MULTIPURPOSE LANDSCAPING
You have tons of ideas but limited space. No worries. Design some parts of your home landscape to play more than one role or serve multiple purposes. Think functional as well as beautiful. You can find a wide array of good ideas online or by browsing at a garden center. Here are a few examples:
Terrace a steep site so there are beds of plants alternating with flat, open spaces and stairs connecting them.
Devote half of a backyard to soft grass for the kids to tumble in, and the other half to a patio or deck with outdoor furniture so they can be easily supervised by lounging adults.
Replace a lawn with planter boxes flanking wide paths that lead to a destination dining/grilling area.
Attach decorative containers to a privacy wall or fence, and fill with various colorful and cascading plants.
Choose food plants that are also beautiful, such as blueberry bushes, Swiss chard, scarlet runner beans, even certain grain plants.
Designing a Low-Maintenance Landscape
Planning your landscape, installing the structures and plants, and admiring your efforts of the finished project are the most gratifying parts of the landscape process. They’re also the most time-consuming (whether you do it all yourself, or hire help).
If you want less maintenance, here are some good, sensible ideas:
If you’re often away, traveling for business or pleasure, you may want a yard with hardscape and very few plants. (See Part 2 for more on hardscape.)
Avoid overplanting or using fast-growing plants that get too large for their space. They’ll need to be pruned or even, in time, removed.
Having cut flowers in annual beds adds lots of color to your yard, but you’ll need to replant when you harvest for bouquets. Use lower-maintenance perennials or flowering shrubs instead.An annual is a plant that completes its life in a single season, and they’re generally planted once a year; find out more in Chapter 13. Perennials, on the other hand, return year after year and tend to be more full and floriferous as they mature. Chapter 14 explains perennials in more detail.
Lawns are a lot of work and consume a lot of resources. Determine whether you want one. Consider having a much smaller one, or instead plant an easy-going groundcover. Check out Chapter 16 for ideas.
If you plan to build wooden landscape elements like decks (refer to Chapter 8) and fences (see Chapter 6), plan on painting or applying preservatives every two to three years. Masonry (brick and concrete) needs