An attractive lawn and garden begin with careful landscaping. But you don’t have to spend much money to make a big impact. Use these following expert tips to give your landscape more color, texture, features, and points of interest.
Hire Experts
As fun as gardening really is, there is a big difference between a little gardening as a hobby and being able to maintain your backyard at all times. If you are busy with work or your family, finding enough time to keep your yard looking its best is not always easy.
This is why you need to know that you can hire experts to help you. Whether you need a lawn maintenance service or you want to have your entire backyard landscaped, starting from scratch, there will be a team of professionals who can do the job. This will save you time and effort and provide you with a yard to be proud of.
Know What You Want And Need
Write down your needs and wants. Do your kids need somewhere to play? Want to grow your own vegetables? Your family might like to get together on a patio, is that possible right now or does some work have to be done?
Do some rough sketches of your yard and think about where you want to put things. This is a great way for people who are just starting out in landscape design to keep track of their ideas. They don’t have to be detailed plans. For example, they could just be ideas or a sketch. You don’t have to spend a lot of time or money to try out different ideas if you have planned things out in advance.
Make It Look Good All Year Round
Evergreen shrubs keep their leaves or needles all year, so they provide cover and color all year long. Even in the winter, this will keep your backyard looking interesting. When placed near the house in good spots, like in front of corners, evergreen plants can help soften the vertical lines of the house, making it look more inviting.
Think About Drainage
If you cover your whole site with hard landscaping that doesn’t let water through, it will be much harder for water to drain away. If you live in an area where it rains a lot, the last thing you want is for your home to flood because of how you landscaped it.
Lawns, borders, and graveled areas all let water drain well, and many traditional hardscaping materials are now available in permeable versions. Use rainwater harvesting as much as you can. Saving what falls from the sky for free is very helpful when it’s dry, and you need to water your garden.
Include Walkways
Instead of trampling the grass and making a path of dead grass between the various elements of your yard, use stepping stones, organic flagstone, decorative brick, or crushed stone to make an attractive walkway. To pull your landscaping together, it’s all about how you connect the different parts.
Try building a path, walkway, or other landscaping feature out of the same or a similar material to what’s on the outside of the house, like brick or stone. This will make the path look like it belongs with the house. Or, use the material to make a beautiful border along the path.
Think About The Location Of Elements
Look at how the sun and wind move. You might want to put a patio on the west side of the house, but it will get a lot of sun in the afternoon, which could make dinner in August uncomfortable. A fire pit will go out quickly if the wind is whistling around a corner. These are common mistakes that people who are just starting out with backyard landscaping make. You should think about what the sun and wind do at different times of the day and year when you design something.
Use Mature Plants
If you start a new garden from bulbs, seeds, and small plants, it will take a long time to grow up. Buying mature plants is costly, but you need to carefully choose a few species to give your garden privacy and height. For instant privacy, try a pleached tree or bamboo for example.
When planting flowers and bushes, it’s best to add new plants over time and build up your borders. Keep in mind that most small plants will become established in one or two growing seasons, so make sure you leave enough room for them.
