About Designer Gardens
A designer garden may be a Japanese style garden, or an English cottage garden. It may be seasonal, with color exploding throughout the year. It may also reflect the natural landscape, such as a chaparral garden in Southern California. Garden design uses components of horticulture, agriculture and landscape architecture.
Outdoor living space
Design your garden as an extension of your indoor living area. As in any living area, you have walls, a floor and a ceiling. The ceiling may be the sky, an awning or a gazebo roof. The floor may be the earth, the wooden porch or a cement BBQ patio area with a pool. Walls may consist of shrubs and rocks bordering a section of your garden or it may be the fencing around the backyard. Your outdoor living area may be as elaborate as a pool or as simple as grass, with a couple of wooden chairs and a small table. The limita are your imagination and available time to create your piece of paradise.
Shaping your living space
Your home is divided into separate rooms. Your backyard or front yard is no different. Segment or divide your yard into separate gardens. You may have a cooking area of herbs and a vegetable garden. Design a Japanese garden area with a koi pond and a wooden walkway leading to a bridge over the pond leading to the patio. In the front yard, you may want a succulent garden, with native South West plants or an English cottage garden, depending on your climate.
Designing your garden
- Draw a sketch of your present outdoor landscaping.
- Take pictures of your front and back yard.
- Go online to any of the number of free landscape design websites.
- Upload the photos on the website's interface.
- Experiment with the many garden landscaping scenarios in their library. Most use a drag and drop interface so re-doing your landscaping is relatively easy.
- When you find idea you like, budget to make your dream a reality.