Fitting Flower Gardens Into Your Landscaping

Landscaping is what brings together the elements of your natural surroundings. It coordinates the trees, flowers, rocks and other ingredients in your lawn to create a pleasing overall picture. Essentially, landscaping is a design process for the exterior of your property.

If you choose to have a flower garden, it should be an attractive, restful place that visitors will want to be part of. Personal flower gardens should also mirror the personality of the owner, or at least the personality that the owner wants to portray. The point is that a garden should be most comfortable to the person who will be enjoying it most often.

For a design perspective, flower gardens should blend with your existing (or planned) landscaping. Your garden should please you first, but if it looks beautiful to visitors, it will increase the value of your property (and build good will with the neighbors).

Flower garden design shares some elements with landscaping. Design ingredients like form, line, scale, texture and color ideally flow throughout your landscape design and incorporate your flower garden design.

What's the most important part? Many people think that color is the key. You don't want the same color throughout, but rather you should try to include colors that complement each other. Clashing colors will have a negative effect on the look of your garden design.

The guideline for form is to plant a mixture of plant shapes and sizes. If all of the plants in your flower garden are only one shape or size, the end result will be uninteresting. Including several shapes and sizes will improve the overall look of your flower garden.

Exactly what does "line" mean in terms of garden design? It has to do with vertical and horizontal flow. Your design should encourage the observer's eyes to flow naturally around the landscape. If the natural elements don't completely do the trick, you can often alter the line of your landscape with fencing.

Appropriate plant size is fairly easy to figure out. Basically, if you can remember not to hide smaller plants behind larger ones, you'll almost always get this part right. Don't forget that plants grow! Plan based on the mature plant size, with larger plants behind smaller ones.

What else ties your flower garden in with your landscaping? Water elements are a perfect addition to any landscape. Ponds and waterfalls are also your best bet to bring serenity and relaxation to your garden.

Don't forget the human element in your flower garden. You'll want to include natural-looking walkways that encourage visitors to enter your creation. There are several excellent material choices for walkways, including brick, cobblestone, sand, pebbles and stone. Again, choose what fits in well with your existing landscape and your personality.

To sum up, if you want your flower garden to fit in well with your landscape, then choose a theme for both. Once you have an overall theme (like tropical oasis or English garden), then it will be easy to choose within that them and achieve a pleasant, natural continuity.

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