How To Wow With Landscape Design
Whenever someone sees a property, the landscaping is one of the first things that will make an impression. There is more to that impression, though, than positioning a few strong trees and a couple of pretty flowers. Design matters. You can amplify a property's wow factor with these four landscape design ideas.
Flow
The difference between some nice stuff bunched together and landscaping design often starts with the visual flow. Look at a well-landscaped public space you consider beautiful. Observe how one part of the design flows into the next.
Every location will be different for a variety of reasons. Sometimes the topography dictates the flow more than anything abstract or artistic. That is fine. The important thing is that a viewer can quickly make sense of where their eyes should go next when they look at the landscape. For example, two large trees on either side of a boxed-in urban landscape might frame the open space in between so the eye goes to the middle.
Depth
Even people who have a strong sense of design often forget to pay attention to depth when they deal with landscapes. This is the idea that there should be a foreground, middle ground, and background. In the simplest example, there might be flowers in the foreground, bushes in the middle, and trees in the background. This pattern ensures there won't be a boring space as the viewer looks deeper into the landscape design.
Colors
This is one of the trickier aspects of landscaping because plants don't operate on an on-demand basis when it comes to color. If you want color year-round, you will have to plan very carefully around how the plants will bloom.
The key is to be accommodating to what nature wants. May tulips can't help you come October, but maple trees can. Sequencing the colors based on your plants' seasonality will go a long way to ensure you'll have something visually compelling on the property throughout much of the year.
Negative Space
People often think of visual compositions in terms of things they see. If they're looking at a bush, they see leaves and branches. Negative space, however, speaks to what lies between things. Particularly if you want to have something visually interesting during the down part of the growing cycle in winter, you should think about how plants create negative space. How the sky or the background shows through the branches and leaves can be as exciting as the plants themselves.
Contact a professional to learn more about landscape design.
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