Yogi Berra once said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll never get there.” The same goes with landscapes. Installation without a landscape design probably will not meet your objectives.

Many projects can be designed on site using rope, spray paint, and flags without the use of drawings. Larger, more complicated projects, however, often require drawings. Either way, a good installation requires a good design and we follow the same principles. These principles are as follows:

Dense plantings with plants generally on 12-18 inch centers to reduce weeding, eliminate mulch, and promote self healing.

A structural layer, sometimes known as accent plants to draw the eye. These can be trees, shrubs, or taller perennials.

A perennial layer of blocks of perennials that flower across the growing season to support pollinators and as eye candy. This provides legibility in a dense planting.

A matrix layer of grasses and/or sedges underneath the perennial layer to provide structure, support for taller perennials, and to fill in space for weed control.

Here is how that might look by way of an example:

First, the structural layer

Structural layer of plants

Then the perennial layer

Perennial layer of plants

And last the matrix layer of a grass

Matrix layer of a grass

And putting it all together.

All layers of plants together

Here is a whole residential landscape with all the layers depicted in a 3-D view.

Here are some other designs we have completed.

If you want to learn more about native landscape design contact us.