Connecting With Nature Through Landscaping.

Landscape Ideas

The Goal
The real goal of any landscape project is to help people connect.  We live in a world that is disconnected.  People drive to work on asphalt, work in a cubicle, and come home to drywall, paint, and nylon carpet.  It’s not ideal.  People feel disconnected to the world around them.  This feeling leads people to feel depressed. 

Nature is the antidote.  Nature is much more beautiful than man made products.  Nature has much variety and appears random.  To connect with nature, our landscape needs to provide privacy, natural products, and a theme. 

Privacy
Do you like your neighbor watching you have a barbeque?  It may not bother you a lot, but it’s certainly not ideal.  To create privacy you will need a natural screen.  This can be accomplished in several ways.

1- Arborvitae: is an evergreen that grows up to 50 feet tall.  They grow up to 3 feet per year.  The green giant or Thuja makes the tallest screen.  They like full sun and well drained soil.

2- Lombardy Poplar: is very fast growing at up to six feet per year.  It makes a great wind break and privacy screen.  However, due to its high disease rate and small lifespan of 25 years max it isn’t recommended by professionals.

3- Bamboo: Is the fastest growing plant in the world.  Some bamboo can grow up to 70 feet tall.  The types with runners are more aggressive and grow faster.  Most Bamboo you buy at the nursery will generally grow around 10 feet tall.

4- Rose of Sharon: is a Hibiscus plant that grows at least ten feet high.  It blooms lots of beautiful flowers in the mid to late summer.  It makes an excellent privacy hedge, but will require some trimming. 

5- Trees: Nearly any tree can be a privacy screen.  Many trees will give you added privacy, but not tight privacy.  Maple trees grow faster than most other trees and are usually more desirable for screens.  Evergreens grow way to slow to be a privacy screen.

Natural Products
High end landscapes have one thing in common; everything is natural.  You won’t find a vinyl fence outside a 20 million dollar home.  Part of the reason it that high end landscapes are professionally designed and designers take pride in things looking right. 

I am not saying that you should never use man made products because they have their place.  If however, it’s in your budget natural products will help you connect to nature.

Here is a list of natural products to consider: cedar, redwood, flagstone, boulders, plants, topsoil, compost, mulch, bark, grass, trees, etc.  Most of the natural products are plants; of course. 

Here are some man made products to avoid: rail road ties; vinyl, concrete, man made stones, vinyl or aluminum siding, rubber mulch, artificial turf, artificial plants and trees, and curbing.  These items have their place, but in and ideal landscape these items won’t be required. 

Themes 
Mother Nature has a theme.  For example, you don’t find Cattails growing in the middle of the desert with cactus.  Nature sticks to themes and so should you. 

Possible themes to choose from are desert, tropical, eastern United States, high mountain meadows and, prairies and grasslands of the Midwest.  Themes should focus on at least three distinct colors.  You should choose which colors you are trying to bring out before you design the project. 

Consider carefully the foreground and background.  You want lower plants in front and larger plants in back.  You need to account for the view you might have from several different points of your yard. 

Themes should include the proper use of texture.  Good texture has a combination of hardscape softened by flowers, shrubs, and trees.  Consider carefully the hardscape items before you begin your project.  In this way, you can build the plants and landscape in a much more focused way.  Figure out what items you want to stand out and work on bringing these items out.