Curb appeal - plants and light fixtures (lots of pictures)
Hello everyone,
I'd love to get your advice on how to make my yard more attractive. I'm not very good with plants (ie, I don't know which ones to pick, and they tend to die on my). My house faces north, and so these pictures are mostly in the shadows.
My main question is what to do with the area to the right of my driveway. Right now it has a fairly large tree (not a weeping willow but similar), some azaleas, and ornamental rosemary. The ground there is hard and rocky - I've spent a lot of time trying to improve the soil but it's quite packed down. I planted 2 jasmine plants but these haven't spread the way I'd hoped. The bed continues up the walk to the front door, where I have some roses that have done surprisingly well.
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I'm ok digging out all of the plants that are there and starting over, although I'd like to be able to reuse them somewhere else in my yard.
A related question has to do with the light fixtures. They're not in great shape and the glass is broken in the one by the street. Any ideas for something that would look more updated?
Finally, there are other beds, both raised beds right by the house and then a long one in front of the house, that need spiffing up. The raised beds are in almost complete shade since they're under the porch, although I've had some success with impatiens there. Right now there's a fern in the small bed on the left of the front door, and two bleeding hearts in the bed on the right of the door. The white flowers are cyclamen that I planted at Christmas which have mostly survived.
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The bed in front of the porch used to have more azaleas, which I've managed to drive to extinction over the years. Primroses do well there in the winter, and I've planted impatiens there in the summers.
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I live in California in an area where it never freezes, if that helps.
Any and all ideas welcomed!
Here is a link that might be useful: Yard pictures
Comments (29)
texanjana
16 years ago
annkathryn
16 years agoHi texanjana,
I wonder if the angle of my photo makes it seem like the tree is more overwhelming than it really is? At any rate, my neighbors have one exactly like this and have trimmed it back quite a bit, so I could do the same with mine. I've trimmed the bottom but not the side branches. I appreciate your comment & suggestion!
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