If you’ve ever seen a home, commercial building, or educational institution that has just a lawn in front of it and no flowers, trees, or bushes, you probably thought something looked a bit off. Even the greenest, lushest lawns (like the kind you get when you have TLC do your lawn care) need some ornamentation to really look their best. In this week’s article, we’ll look at some other landscaping elements that can make your home or business look great! TLC Nursery & Outdoor Living offers landscape installation, seasonal clean-ups, and hardscaping installation.
Hardscaping
The next time you look at the landscaping in the backyard of a home, or as you walk up to your favorite brick and mortar shop, take a longer look and you’ll see that hardscaping sets the stage for everything that is going on in the landscaping. Common hardscaping elements include sidewalks of cement of stone pavers, retaining walls, water features, brickwork, fire pits, outdoor kitchen areas, patios, and any other structures such as gazebos.
The Role of Hardscaping
The solid elements listed above act as the bones of an overall landscaping plan. It is important to remember that an overall plan needs to be in place when the hardscaping is planned. The results of the plan need to meet the needs and desires of the owner of the property as well as being functionally logical. The long-term plans for the property. Hardscaping elements have to keep other factors such as the sunlight, drainage, and traffic flow in mind to create great and useful space. Well-designed hardscaping takes a long-term view to the property and acts as an intermediary between nature and the structure in your yard, creating beautiful, useful spaces in the process.
To understand how hardscaping acts to shape the space it inhabits, we’ll look at a few examples.
- Raised beds are a great way to define the space and direct traffic. If a bed is raised just a few inches and includes elements such as strategically placed rocks, traffic flow can be diverted to the door of your home or business and help people stay out of flower beds and off the lawn.
- Having designated flower beds limits your lawn mowing needs, makes it easy to weed the flower areas, and concentrates the watering and fertilizing needs in the flower areas.
- Water features are a wonderful way to liven up an ordinary landscape. A small fountain or pond gives you the tranquil sounds of running water and will bring birds to your yard. You can also play with water plants and for some gardeners, this is a major factor in choosing a water feature.
- Fire pits create a space for gathering and enjoyment on cold evenings. Placing an area for a BBQ grill nearby can give create the foundations of many parties.
- Lighting is also part of the hardscaping and plays a role in both the safety and the beauty of a home or business. Whether you are lighting up your business sign, your favorite specimen tree, or a door for security, this aspect of hardscaping is very important.
- A gazebo can be a lively addition to a large yard or gathering spot at a business. An extra bonus is that the footprint of the gazebo will limit your lawn square footage and so your lawn maintenance and mowing.
Landscaping
From the smallest flower to the largest tree a good landscaping design uses a wide view of both the growing year and the lifespan of the plant. For instance, when planting a tree, the mature height needs to be considered, as does the placement for shading, and annual flower and fall foliage displays need to be considered.
- Here are some more examples of how landscaping decisions made.
- When planting a flower bed, the flowering schedule needs to be considered, so you have flowers blooming from early spring until the first hard frost.
- Trees can be planted strategically to help with heating and cooling costs. Evergreens should be planted on the north side of the house while deciduous trees that lose their leaves in the autumn should be planted on the south side to shade the home or business from the summer sun, but to allow winter sun to warm the building.
- Specialty flower gardens are also a fun item to include in your landscaping plan. For example, you could plant a bee and hummingbird flower garden.
To find out how TLC Nursery & Outdoor Living can help you have the most beautiful garden possible, call us today.