Why a Garden Design?

Garden Design is more than designing garden spaces. It’s about who we are… it’s about what we see, how we feel and how we translate all that into a place with flowers and trees making those spaces personal reflections of ourselves.

When we move and change our home to one that has no garden and no sense that there ever was one, it can be overwhelming to start from scratch whether you’ve already had a garden or you just want to start one.

In the book,, ‘The Brain that Changes Itself” Norman Doidge says that when we make a ‘modest’ change, such as moving to a new house, we find that something as basic as our sense of space, which we took for granted and seemed so natural before- must be slowly altered while the brain rewires itself. Yuk…

If you’re like me, I don’t want to do the slow altering thing… I want it to happen now… I want the house decorated now and I want the garden to grow… NOW….

Imagine then, having not only to adjust to a new house, but a new outdoor space.. maybe it would help to see that space as a blank canvas for us to start with a fresh new design for our garden spaces.

Once in awhile, nature gives us a little help. When a dead tree started to fall and had to be taken down, it opened up my whole back yard. I say yard, because there was no garden… just an open space.

I wasn’t a gardener so I had no idea how to design a garden – in fact, it never occurred to me that I would be designing spaces that would even be called a garden. So of course, what is the first thing we always think of? Yep, grass…. Thick green grass. Kind of like a canvas only soft and wonderful to walk on. So, grass it was…. And it was good.

Oh, and a big ol’ tin shed… not MY choice because it was just not pretty, but it was new and it would hold all the stuff that needed a place to live. Someday when I redesign this garden, I have an idea for a great (and pretty) shed and I shall call it a garden house. There, doesn’t that sound better?

But back to the garden design. The yard was a rectangle with long straight sides… and I like curves - so I carved out some curvy edges under a pair of huge Blue Spruce…. Of course nothing was growing there except years of Spruce needles…. and I didn’t know any better… all I saw was - there were no weeds to pull so I made a garden.

And a few weeks later… here is what happened.

I believe that this was a yard with a garden in its heart - just waiting to be set free… well, that’s where I came in.

The following year, I decided that the shed, although shiny and new, and very practical, just did not suit my garden design. Yes, I finally admitted I knew I wanted certain things… but not sure exactly what - but sometimes the best things come from unexpected places. But I knew I had to do something with that shed.

I spent a month at a writer’s workshop in Provence a few years before, and those hills of lavender still haunted me… most likely because I brought back all the lavender soap I could carry and even planted some – lavender that is…. It seemed our summers were as hot as theirs, and the prevailing westerly wind in my yard… oops, garden… was more like the Mistral than a breeze, so I brought a little of Provence to my garden and it set the tone for colour and gave me more ideas.

With a few small cans of exterior paint and a photo in hand, I painted a scene on the front doors of the tin shed. I found a couple of old windows in the basement, painted them and hung them on lattice on either side of the doors… Voila ! my shed made me smile and feel like I had some of those Provencal hills closer to home. You don’t have to be an artist to do this…. Copy someone else’s painting or photo – or – have a creative friend something for you.

I think it looks better, don’t you? At any rate it pleased me.

Little by little, I made those original flowerbeds with deeper curves and added more plants as I found some I liked.

When the tree in my neighbour’s yard died, I had no shade… just blistering sun and wind. Not a good combination for growing too much. Although roses like the sun, they sometimes are blasted about and battered by the wind that swept down along the backs of the neighbouring yards.

I discovered a lilac that was fast growing, had luscious scented blooms that blossomed later than the regular lilacs or Common Lilac (Syringa Vulgaris) – it is called a “Preston Lilac” (Syringa Prestoniae- Nellie Bean) and I planted it on the west side with the idea it would grow to block the wind.

When you design your garden, think about dividing it into areas if you can… I pulled the edges of the west bed (windward side) out further - jutting way into the garden and planted Pretty Miss Preston in it then put a bench around the corner. Now you can just see the edge of the bench and it always makes me want to go there and sit for awhile and see what is going on in that nook. Like this….

Sure enough in less than 4 years, it was 8 feet tall…. With lovely large, heart-shaped leaves and beautiful grey stems that let me look through them to the back of the garden.

and this year, how simply glorious…. No muss, no fuss, just glory !

Now it gives lovely shade to the Solomon Seal that popped up one Spring and the wood violets that did the same. Mind you, I did find a few violets here and there when I moved in and each Spring more came up and more and more… I kept moving them from shady place to shady place and those lovely green leaves keep the soil moist in the areas where there is little sun. They shield the roots of more delicate plants too. They are a lovely part of my Shade garden. I do have to be ruthless, however as they would happily take over my entire garden.

The rest of the garden grew bit by bit. For example, you saw how the Bed of Roses grew from the stump of that old tree and each year, I keep adding another rosebush or two. This year, my Beautiful Daughter gave me a glorious rose called “Cherry Parfait” and its blooms have been full for almost 6 weeks… and there are more buds.

You can see the progression when you look at the Bed of Roses page, but I will show you the desperate way it looked in the beginning and how it looks only 4 years later.

Make sure, if you like an informal look, that you make the edges curved. Don’t be afraid to exaggerate the curves… tiny curves will look rather ditsy…. Or amateurish. Undulating curves are pleasant to the eye – well to mine anyway. Like these….

Actually, you can do this garden design thing, a couple of ways…. You can get an idea of what you want by looking at other gardens or magazines, and then gradually carve out the shape and look you like…. Or… you can make the beds the shape and size you want, prepare the soil and lay down sheets of newspaper, wet it well and cover with mulch. Then you can go about finding the plants to put into those spaces.. a few at a time, or as you can afford.

Personally, I like the first way, because as the years go by, my garden changes. When I add a statue or a new plant, sometimes I have to make the bed bigger to accommodate it. Or I move it to another spot when I find something different. Rather like a new garden every year.

We should talk about plants, shouldn’t we?? Perennials? And annuals? How to choose? And colour… we started to talk about colour in the beginning of the garden design and left it to talk about shape.

Remember the colour wheel on the page about Container Gardens ?

The same goes for flowerbeds. Think about how you want to feel in your garden. Do you work all day indoors so that when you come home you want to spend time on your deck or in your garden? Then your colours should reflect the gentle and relaxing shades of soft pinks, mauves and blues. Different shades of green will do the same thing.

If you depend on your garden to give you a jolt of energy, then you might choose vibrant reds, yellows and oranges…

When you design your garden, make room for lots of perennials… they come up every year, which saves planting them every Spring. However the down side of that is that if you only plant perennials, your garden will look much the same from year to year…. Make room for annuals too. They will provide a lot of the colour in your garden and guess what? You can change the look of your flowerbeds from year to year by changing the colour of your annuals… win win…. How great is that?

When all is said and done, your garden design depends mostly on how you want to feel in your garden spaces – and if you plant for that feeling, the design will follow naturally. If you want order and symmetry, your garden will have straight lines and present with a calm and formal look.

If you want your eye to roam around your garden, stopping in nooks and hidden spots, then you will have lots of curves and winding paths to lure you into those spaces.

Your colours will follow your preferences… and when you go to the garden centres, you will fall in love, over and over and over again.

Follow your heart, plant what you love (and for your zone), take care of it and you will never (well, hardly ever) be disappointed. Your garden design will reflect you and what you love about those spaces in your garden , whether private or public.