6 Traditional Landscaping Ideas for Your Garden

Your garden is the first thing people see when they come up or pass by your house. As such, it’s important that you take the right landscaping decisions in order to make a great visual impact. Luckily there are many beautiful and wonderful ways to make your home inviting and appealing using your garden as the focal piece. Follow along our list of traditional landscaping ideas for your garden that are both attractive and functional; helping you to create the stunning garden we know you will cherish.

Greet Guests

Flowers always make a home seem more welcoming. If you decorate your front garden with assorted annuals and perennials, you can keep your home colourful all year long! Think Petunias, Snapdragons, Lily-of-the-Nile to really set the scene for the front of your home. Another great flower choice is Crinums. Crinums are beautiful lily-like flowers that are practically indestructible; they laugh at drought, don’t need fertilizer, and welcome hot, humid summers.

Another quick tip for those of you with only a small space between your house and the street: make a low fence that runs along the front of your yard. This little landscaping trick gives the illusion that your house is actually farther from the street than it really is, and also makes a great space for planting flowers and vines.

Plant Vines

Another way to make the most of your garden landscape is by planting lovely rambling vines. There’s really nothing more stately or romantic than deep green tendrils that wind around fences and columns. There are a couple different options here depending on the look you’re going for. We recommend a delicate, flowering vine species that offer blossoms of blue, purple, red, pink, or white that really adds that extra little pop to your yard. Clematis is probably one of your best options as it is one of the showiest and versatile vine species out there. Growing these on a fence, a trellis, or in a container is usually the go-to look for these plants, but if you’re going for a more laissez-faire gardening style, feel free to let them ramble over your shrubs and perennials.

Planters and Baskets

Add lovely, eye-catching layers to your yard with elevated planters and hanging baskets to stay away from a one-dimensional landscaping design. This strategy is one of the easiest ways to create visual interest with minimal effort. You’ll find that adding elevated planters and hanging baskets to your garden really fills out the space, creating a sea of beautiful color from high to low. We recommend that each basket should contain three types of plants:

– A “spiller” that hangs down over the edges (begonias and variegated sage)

– A “filler” that mounds and fills in (Kong coleus)

– A “thriller” that is tall and eye-catching for the center (purple cordyline)

Garden Surprise

Take the time to create a hidden garden paradise in your yard by constructing intersecting trails, meandering streams, inspiring vistas, and hidden rooms. These small hideaways provide a spot to escape, where people can gather for drinks and conversation “away from it all”. Depending on how much room you have to work with, you can create multiple pathways, each with its own lovely garden vignette. If you’re feeling particularly inspired, you can also get creative and save the biggest garden surprise for the farthest spot in your yard. Create a secret garden with a wall of plants, a fountain, a statue, a bench, or a special flower display that is hidden away from everything.

Hide Outdoor Structures

Sheds, garages, and outdoor workspaces are not always the most attractive accents and can sometimes detract from your carefully curated landscape. Luckily, you can hide these structures while making the most of these spaces by using them as a setting for a beautiful display of plants and flowers! Add brackets and a wooden plank to create a shelf on the exterior of a structure above the entrance or around its windows. Then, set lightweight fiberglass planters filled with flowers to hide the structure and add natural ambience to the entryway. Potted ferns are also great additions to run along the base of whatever structure you’re trying to incorporate because they give an earthy accent to the threshold. Bringing your plants both nearer and actually onto the walls of the structure will make it look like a seamless complement to the greenspace.

Deer-Proofing

One of the most heartbreaking moments in gardening is coming out to find your flowers have all been eaten by deer. However, despite how tenacious these animals are, it’s not as hard as you might think to choose flowers that people find glorious and deer find disgusting! We recommend that you choose perennials like butterfly weed, globe thistle, ‘Royal Red’ butterfly bush, or even purple cornflower for your next garden landscaping project if deer have been a problem in the past. If you include these plants in your garden you’ll have a flowerbed full of gorgeous leaves and blooms that you won’t have to worry about since deer won’t touch them.

With some thought out additions and well placed flora, your garden is going to be the talk of the town! Just wait to see people slow down as they drive by, or picture the look on your friend’s faces as you lead them down to your secret garden oasis. Be sure to check out SkyHomes for more tips and tricks like these as well as information about our communities.