As a homeowner, you invested a great sum of money in your property. When you look out of the window, you do not want to see an empty landscape, right? Therefore, landscaping your garden is as important as buying a home. At this point, you should know about landscape design, have some landscaping ideas and be familiar with much more things about landscaping.
Here, we prepared useful guidelines, simple tips and practical ideas for landscaping your garden. These will definitely give you inspiration and new ideas about your landscaping project. Let us get started.
What is Landscaping?
Landscaping means modifying the visible features of land. More specifically, for homeowners, it is modifying the visible features of a garden. It involves forming living elements like plants, shaping the terrain, constituting features like walkways, driveways or ponds and considering some practical needs like irrigation or protection against weather conditions. It mainly combines horticulture with artistic design and aesthetics. Functionality is another important element in landscaping. It designs the outdoor features of our home and makes it easy our indoor life. 
Why Landscaping?
Homeowners engage in landscaping mainly for two purposes. One of them is aesthetic purpose. All homeowners enjoy having a beautiful garden. Nobody wants a jungle-like yard and an outdoor mess. In fact, outdoor beauty complements indoor beauty. Unless we ensure the outdoor aesthetics of our home, it will be meaningless how well we design the interior of our home. The second purpose is practical needs. An unevenly growing tree may pose a threat to the foundation of your house. You will need walkways to access your home or driveways to park your car. It would be nice to have a place for dinner or barbecue in the yard. Whatever your purpose is, landscaping your garden properly and proficiently is important for the aesthetic and practical use of your garden.
What are the Types of Landscaping Features?
When we landscape our garden, we usually add these features to our garden:
Planting Beds
We enliven our yard by adding planting beds. We add some flowering beds or shrubs consisting of ornamental trees. Or we can add vegetable beds. Different combinations of planting beds will give your garden a magnificent look. It is up to your imagination whichever design you will choose.
Lawns
Lawns are indispensable parts of a garden. They are easy to grow and add a lush green to your garden. Watering properly and fertilizing are enough to care for lawns.
Walkways and Driveways
You can have different walkways according to the landscape of your house. Stone walkways are the most ideal and rustic ones. You can lay the stones on a concrete or sand foundation. On the other hand, driveways are a must for you if you want to park your car inside your property. You can pave your driveway with materials like concrete, asphalt, gravel or pavers.
Fences
You will definitely need fences to keep intruders away from your property. Fences also serve for aesthetic purposes. Picket fences, post-and-rail fences, baluster fences, vinyl fences and split-rail fences are among your choices.
Fountains and Ponds
İf you want to combine green with turquoise watercolor in your yard, you should build small fountains or ponds. This allows you to experience the freshness, lushness and serenity of nature.
Shrubs, Foundation Planting and Flowering Trees
Shrubs give you a wonderful color combination starting from spring through autumn. Shrubs also successfully cover concrete and give your property a natural look. Foundation plantings are another way to hide the traces of the foundation. You can have this planting as an entryway planting, corner planting or plantings that cover the distance between the entryway and corners. Another way of coloring your garden is flowering trees. When their flowers bloom in spring, you will have a fabulous landscape in your garden.
What are the Principles of Landscaping?
There are certain principles that you should obey when you landscape your garden. Even if you find it a theoretical issue, applying these principles will play a great role in achieving success in your landscaping project. Here are the most outstanding ones.
- Natural topography should be retained. Landscaping should be in harmony with the natural scenery.
- There should be focal points that you can enjoy with your family or friends.
- Landscaping should give a mass effect in terms of planting. That said, planting should not be monotonous.
- There should be a harmony between the landscaping features in terms of style, feeling and function.
- You must make people feel that your garden is spacious. For this purpose, you can leave large open places, especially on lawns.
- If you divide your garden into sections, there should be flexible passages between the sections.
- In order to have a pleasant outlook on your property, the dimensions of your garden should be proportional.
- You should choose and adjust the texture according to your dream garden. For example, if you dream about a green garden or a dessert garden, your choice of the texture should be in accordance with it.
- The same thing applies to your choice of the color and tone of your garden.
- You may get bored with the landscape of your yard in time. Therefore, your landscaping of your yard should be flexible and versatile. It should be possible to turn your garden into different styles with small touches.
As a homeowner, what should you consider before you start a landscaping project?
To get the most out of your landscaping project, you should meticulously and properly plan it. Roughly, you should take into consideration the following factors.
Will you do the project yourself or hire a professional?
If you have enough time, and you believe you have enough skills, you can try DIY landscaping. If you can manage it, you can save a lot. However, if you are short of time and feel you lack in required skills, it is wiser to hire a professional, which will be costly. In the first place, you should decide on this and then start your landscaping project.
What is your budget for the project?
Every homeowner has a decent income and can get a loan in proportion to this income. If you start a challenging landscaping project and cannot finance it, you cannot continue the project. And, your effort for having a flawless landscape may turn into a disaster.
You should schedule the right time for your landscaping project
Even if you hire a professional, you should be able to spare some of your time for the landscaping project. If you work full time or have a busy business schedule, and there is no somebody else to care for the project, you may have difficulty in communicating your thoughts and wishes to the contractor. It is best to arrange your landscaping project at a time suitable for you and take part in, if partially, the landscaping process.
Communicate well what you really want to your contractor
Your negotiation with your contractor should be long enough to communicate all of your thoughts and wishes to it. For this, be patient and talk with the contractor until you reach an agreement that will satisfy your wishes and dreams.
5 Landscape Checks for Homebuyers
The exterior of the property you are planning to buy is as important as the interior of it. Many homebuyers disregard this fact. Not to face unwanted surprises, you should care about the following checks among others.
Water and drainage problems in the garden
You should check if there is ponding water or high water part outside the property that you are planning to buy. These can signal a water and drainage problem. Real estate agents are reluctant to talk about this problem. They will only focus on the interior beauty of the property. As a result, you should pay due attention to this problem. If not, you may have a flooding problem in winters or when it rains or snows heavily.
Overall condition of the landscape
The property may look awesome from distance. However, when you have a close look, the overall condition of the landscape may not be so good. There may be trees or bushes hiding windows. There may be cracks on the patio or walkway. Repairing them later may be costly for you.
Pay attention to huge trees
These trees may pose a threat to the foundation of the property. They may harm fences, the garden, the property and even your life, so you should check them before you buy the property.
The property should not be on a slope
The steep areas in your property limit the use of your property. For example, your property has 3,000 square meters, but you can only use 2,000 square meters.
The property should have a proper irrigation system
An irrigation system is necessary for keeping your yard green. If the property does not have a proper irrigation system, it will be costly to have it installed or repaired.
What is Landscape Design?
Landscape design is about the design and makeover of your yard. The designer designs your garden, considering the stated elements below,
What are the Basic Elements of Landscape Design?
- Texture
- Scale
- Line
- Form
- Color
Designing Backyard
Your backyard offers you a spacious area to try different makeovers. You can create areas to welcome your guests, build houses for your pets, furnish the backyard with lawns for an open space or add different features.
Designing Front Yard
You usually have a limited space for your front yard. It is usually used for entrance. You can enhance the visual quality of your front yard by adding a stylish decking or patio.
Designing Small Gardens
You may not be lucky to have a large garden. Having said this, it is possible to get the most out of your small garden with a good landscape design. One of your options for small gardens is container gardens. You can create your garden using decking and adding pots, bowls, boxes or crates. The other option is vertical space. You can utilize the indefinite vertical space of your property to grow succulents, flowers or vegetables.
Landscape Design for Privacy
Fencing is important for ensuring your privacy in your property. For your privacy, you can use high walls. To add beauty to them, you can paint the walls on different sides in different colors. You can use different textures or motives on the walls. You have many options to ensure good landscaping and privacy concurrently.
10 Practical Landscaping Ideas
- You can landscape your garden four seasons using different plants. Shrubs are ideal for all seasons. Flowering trees are best for spring. Fall foliage can be good for autumn.
- You can place your flowers in three layers. The tallest one will be in the front and the shortest one in behind.
- You can use plants like foliage plants that do not fade for all seasons.
- You can add perennial flowers, which will bloom for a long time, to your garden.
- You can add hardscape features to your garden. They show your property as more permanent.
- You can add water features to your garden.
- You can use varying textures and forms in your garden.
- You can keep your garden simple and avoid extra work.
- Succulents are easy to maintain. They can save time and energy for you.
- Learn about the characteristics of the flowers you will plant and plant them accordingly.
What is DIY Landscaping?
DIY is the shortened form of ‘Do it yourself’. DIY landscaping means that you landscape your garden by yourself.
Can I design my Garden by myself?
If you have time and believe that you have enough skills for DIY landscaping, you can design your garden.
Hiring a Landscaping Designer or Contractor
If you do not have enough time and limited DIY landscaping skills, it is best to hire a landscaping designer or contractor. Otherwise, you may waste your time and sources for an unsuccessful landscaping project. Even if hiring a designer or contractor is a bit more expensive than DIY landscaping, professionals will save you from wasting your money on an unsuccessful project.
We have been offering landscaping services to our customers for years and have undertaken numerous successful landscaping projects so far. If you need help from a pro for your landscaping project, you can easily reach out to us on stashoffer.com, You can easily and freely place your order there and benefit from our professional landscaping services.
