Design Like a Pro: Sure Tips for Great Plant Composition

You ’ve researched every plant that grows in your zone and lusted over the single that wo n’t .

Now what ?

One of the toughest parts of planning a garden is picture how many of which establish to put where . Have I got a organization for YOU ? !

After teach pattern to household gardener for the past 20 years , I ’ve developed a elementary scheme that organizes all the plants into one of four categories . Once you ’ve bugger off that done , it ’s just a matter of doing a conventional plan to cipher out the overall massing of the plants .

Here ’s a design I ’m working on for a client , using California aboriginal plant , but this technique works with plant life from any region . We ’ll assume you ’ve been covet stacks of works and through divine interposition ( or checking your bank balance ) you ’ve constringe your pallette to your top ten , including a few from each of the following groupings .

Four Categories

Trees : I was going to define “ trees ” for you , but I ’ve got smart readers so I ’ll save us time . habituate trees to provide shade , screen unpleasant views , and add visual musical scale .

gamy : These are shrubs and supported vine that growhigher than oculus - level . cerebrate of them as theskeletonof the garden . plant from this category act as showing and backdrops for smaller plants . They reduce wind ( I was go to say “ break breaking wind ” but that would be embarrassing ) , frame views , and serve as barrier .

Medium : This category include of shrubs , hardy perennial and decorative grasses develop betweeneye - level and human knee - high . These industrial plant are themusclewe add together to the skeleton . Use them to fill in spaces and as star performers in your color dodging .

Low : These are subshrubs , perennials , and ground cover that staybelow knee tier . They ’re workhorses in my designs , providing seasonal coloring , foreground for deep beds , slope protection , and walk - on endure carpeting . hayfield fall into this family and so do lawn .

Here ’s the complete schematic planting plan . have-to doe with to it as I split up down my principle for plant emplacement .

What Goes Where?

When it come to direct plants in the garden , take off with the trees . They ’re the dominant element and usually include in the architectural plan because they ’ve got workplace to do . ( See above ) . In this example , I ’m using two specie of trees : Mountain Lilac ( Ceanothus ‘ Ray Hartman’[1 ] ) and Western Redbud ( Cercis occidentalis[2 ] ) . Each has a rounded canopy , multiple shrubby branch , and will reach a height of no more than 20 - feet , everlasting for this small chiliad . Notice the unorthodox balance of their placement and how they delineate the space while screen outbound views from the house .

Next up are the gamey shrubs , Tasselbush ( Garrya elliptica [ 3 ] ) with its dramatic catkins , and Flowering Currant ( Ribes sanguineum[4 ] ) , sporting a similar flower form and sultry deep red flowers . I ’ve placed them in irregular groupings for a realistic consequence . I ’m keeping them away from the property business line to forestall having to write out them back , which would destroy their lifelike character .

Medium size plants come next . The genuine workhorses in this garden will be bursts of Deer Grass ( Muhlenbergia rigens[5 ] ) , selected for its excessive vertical form , and Cedros Island Verbena ( Verbena lilicina ‘ De la Mina’[6 ] ) , because its name sound like the heroine in a children ’s storey ( and because it ’s as beautiful as lavender and reek like carnations ! ) . Again , I used them in raw drifts and repeated in different parts of the musical composition to produce continuity .

Small bush , perennial and ground covering fill out the line - up , sail along and bound across the path . Island Alum Root ( Heuchera maxima[7 ] ) adds elegance , and Beardtongue ( Penstemon ‘ Margarita BOP’[8 ] ) outburst onward in blue . For demarcation , piano pink Coral Bells ( Heuchera species[9 ] ) scatter the ground , and small patch of Dune Sedge ( Carex praegracilis[10 ] ) attend as a walkable lawn substitute adjacent to the terrace .

Ten varieties of plants is all it takes to make a beautiful , various garden . When in dubiety , rather than dilute the design with too much kind , use more of the same plant in multiple locations . Pay attention to characteristic divvy up by a few of the flora , like flower coloration , the underlying form of the plant , or foliation size .

I ’d love to hear whether you have a similar approach to planting your garden or if you ’d care to partake your approach .

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