The inspiration picture looks great but I don’t think it would work well in real life. Those three trees look good in the picture, but in 3 years they’re going to be too big for their spots. If they’re still there in 10 years, they’ll cost you $$$ to remove them.

Wait, I might be confused. The very first picture you posted - is that your inspiration picture? I assumed it was. That’s the one with the young trees too close to the house.

I think more information and possibly more pictures are required to set the scene for the present situation - for instance:

- how does the width of the bedroom wing (?) on the left compare to the garage on the right? Is that where the balance to the garage lies? You can’t see from the picture because the left side is not completely shown….

-what is behind the hedge? It looks like there is a table and chair (?) there so is there a porch across there? Is so, where does it end? Would a railing of some sort be better to define the space than the hedge? The black pillars look odd and so does the style of the front door.

- shutters tend to be a focus for a lot of people, although they were common for that age of house. These ones look wider than usual and also somewhat custom. How does their width relate to the width of the windows they relate to?

I think a house like this has lots of potential but I certainly would make some changes…. How big is the lot?

@little bug zone 5 Missouri. The inspo pic is the “stick to your homes style” pic with the stone. I did wonder about the trees. I take they were balancing the raised bed with the height of the trees—- a look I’d like to imitate but with what trees and how many 🤔

The landscape plan seems to have a "path to nowhere" but I don't know what is at the end. That I would not advise. Do you like the more formal, hardscape forward look of your inspiration picture? You could transition to that by dialing down the number of plant species you have, and create large beds of the more structural plants. Your inspiration photo is foliage and pruning dependent.

You could create a raised bed along your front porch, but I can't see a reason to do it, just ads expense. Your lot is flat, unlike your inspiration picture.

Seems like you could maybe whitewash your brick and do a dark trim, which would do more to evoke your inspiration pictures than a major landscape overhaul. Dark garage doors, take off the shutters, dial down the flower beds and replace with more structural shrubs, and you're pretty much there . . .

@woodyoak zone 5. I’ll start with a current photo.

—I feel the bedroom/wing on the left poorly balances the expanse on the right.
—Behind the hedge is shown above. The porch ends about the point of the farthest pillar
—I hadn’t considered a railing. I might need some help visualize that, do you have a photo to show?. My arthritic dog and young kids love to look out the windows so I want to be sure to preserve that lookout for them from lowest parts of the windows as much as possible.
—the pillars are not quite black but the plan is to paint those and the shutters a dark deep green. We have since added a different color to the door (a moody smoky green) but it is a very aged door. I hadn’t quite been ready to spend the money for another so am trying to optimize the situation and if it still doesn’t work we can buy a door. I think I measured the shutters between a 1/4 and 1/3 the width of the window (I haven’t researched what is standard).

— lot size is about 0.3 acres

I do think bringing a wide sidewalk up from the street— similar to the inspo pic— to the door is a good starting point for me but I don’t know what to do with existing sidewalk and I still need something that visually breaks up the right (? A small stone wall vs the raised bed?)

Thanks for the additional pictures… One addional key piece of information is - where are you? Is winter/snow something that would impact landscaping plans?

The third additional photo is particularly useful - that large, heavily pruned shrub on the left side is unattractive to me and must be major work to keep so closely pruned. Was it your or a previous owner’s attempt to ’balance’ the garage? If so, IMO it fails and makes an awkward-looking planting there. Looking at the gable over that wing and the one over the garage, I think still that was the intended balance feature.

What is the big tree on the lawn? It looks like any attempt to put a straight path from the street to the front door would risk damaging the tree roots and/or risk having the path be damaged by the tree roots. Would a path from the street actually be used much? Do guests/visitors park on the street or the driveway? The current path makes sense if guests normally park on the driveway. If only family park on the driveway, an alternative could be a step(s) up to the porch at the end of the porch and then have them walk along the porch - but privacy would be an issue as they’d walk by those windows very closely so the current path might make the most sense.

If the hedge was removed, how wide would the space be for the complete planting bed? Being a gardener that would be my inclination (i.e. remove the hedge and plant a wider flowering/ornamental bed berween the walk and the porch), but if you don’t want to do the garden work, that might not appeal to you.

I like porches so when we renovated here, we created both a front and a back porch that is both roofed-over and has a railing. We don’t have kids but dogs have been a constant part of our lives in the 23 years we have lived here. All the dogs have liked looking out the dining room bay window that looks down the driveway to the road so, from the pictures of your house, it would appear that your dog would have lots of viewing opportunities with the easy ’see through’ styling of most railings :-)

I like front doors with the sidelights rather than the double door you have with the odd-shaped window inset. When you do get around to considering replacing that door, consider the styling and lighting carefully, especially as it affects the interior front hall.

Re the shutters - a lot of people will say the shutters should be half the width of the windows or remove them. Because non-functional/ornamental shutters were common on houses of a certain period, they don’t bother me as much as they do some people, but wider is better than narrower….