Opine on front borders/ curb appeal?
jmilly
2 years ago
I would love ideas on how to balance the landscaping in my front borders. I have a few perennials in place but am not tied to anything. Love the hydrangeas in front but the house needs some evergreen love. I'm in zone 5 and tend towards more formal plantings. Any ideas? I've seen some of you put visualizations together, would love to know how you do that :)
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How to handle curb appeal with no walk to front door?
Comments (22)deee - the walk would never be used. The door is used all the time. Just that there is a quicker easier way to get there by our normal walkway that provides a straighter path and allows easy wheelchair/walker access. I guess my original mention of that wasn't clear enough. I don't feel that the $1K+ that a concrete walk or flagstone path (even more expensive) or pavers (super expensive) would cost is money well spent for US at this time. For that curb appeal I can live without, but I still want it to look nice, but absolutely need easy maintenance. We don't have time to maintain gravel, mulch, or compacted granite paths as they all will have weeds within a week where we are at, so I guess I'm looking at options on what to do without to still have it look nice. I got some great ideas here. Just put a landing there with flag stones and let grass grow in between or fill the space in with plants seems to be some common ones and very workable as well. Jan - sure sounds lovely and I wish we had the time to maintain something like it as I would love that too. We will eventually have a gazebo style on the stock pond that is going to be on the side of the house. We just need our little one to be born and grow much older before we dare having the pond that close to the house. There is one the next lot over that has me worried enough. I'm considering checking with the next builder that will be starting a new house in the neighborhood to see if they could get us a concrete walkway for less while doing another house foundation or driveway, but I can't see spending the money unless it is much lower. Wish we had unlimited funds ........See MoreFront entry needs a curb appeal makeover!
Comments (6)Consider creating a monarch station, maybe in a raised round or contoured bed made of the same kind of bricks that are on your house. There's an organization called monarchwatch.com. You might check it out. Maybe you could line the driveway somehow, with a garden bed or hedge. I think your yard would benefit from more curved shapes. Another thing you might do is to create a small grove of river birch. They are so pretty, and the colors of their bark would blend so attractively with your house. I've seen them in beds toward the front of the yards, along with natural-looking shrubs and flowers. Beautiful. The main thing I would recommend for your yard is to minimize the grass. Not only do lawns use a lot of water, take a lot of work and expense, but a large lawn, in my opinion, is monotonous. And replacing lawn is much better for the environment and the other plantings attract birds, squirrels, and so on....See MoreNo front door...need help with curb appeal
Comments (8)-I would also limb up the tree to allow one to see the front of the house to the eaves. -Decide what you are interested in as far as a garden (if anything) including how much work you want to do. Typically at least some evergreen shrubs, but you may also want some flowering shrubs or flowering perennials. In this case less is more, a few larger blocks rather than one of each kind of plant. Choose shrubs that will remain small enough so that you won’t need to do a lot of trimming to keep them below the height of the windows. Edge can be straight or a long sweeping curve, but not something that wiggles. -Do something to draw attention to your door. It could be as simple as painting a walkway onto your driveway or as complex as adding a roof over the entry to mark out the position of the door. -I would paint the downspouts to match the siding and likely add properly sloped swales to provide drainage away from the house for the downspouts. I don’t find the long tails on the gutters attractive....See MoreImprove curb appeal: First home help; Front landscaping suggestions?
Comments (43)Flo, I like your sketch very much (although without knowing the basic sun/wind info I mentioned above, it may or may not be what she needs.) However, the suggestion of polished black Japanese river stones for a first time home owner in Oklahoma is probably not helpful.b You will drain her budget and she will find herself looking at dusty, not shiny, stones. If she likes your concept of creating a dry bed/ river effect (as I do), you or someone else might teach her how to do this with grasses native to her area. Ones that can be easily propagated by division, require no water or weeding, and will blow in her prairie breezes while attracting birds and wildlife. Can, I urge you to google images of landscapes by Oehme, Van Sweden. They are known for using sweeps of native plants, especially grasses. My suggestion to you is to play around with flexible hoses or ropes in dividing your wide open space to see what shapes please you. Then imagine the spaces filled with different color blocks of various heights. Which ones do you want moving, which ones static? Designing a three dimension landscape from scratch like yours can be overwhelming. Break it down into digestible parts. 1) Gather all information about your conditions. 2) Get out the hoses and ropes and draw on the ground like a canvas....See More
jmilly
2 years ago
cearbhaill (zone 6b Eastern Kentucky)
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agoken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
2 years ago
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Celery. Visualization, Rendering images