Landscape

New Year, New Garden!

By Pat Raven, Ph.D. and Julie Hess

Most gardeners love to stay put and never move so that they can enjoy the maturing beauty of the gardens they create. Some enjoy leaving behind a green legacy to be loved by a new family. At the end of the year, I was packing the last few boxes to leave our hilltop home and garden to downsize into a new place without so many responsibilities. We chose the new house because it has a nearly blank canvas on which to paint a new garden. This year, I’ll try to take you all through the process of building a new landscape.

First, try to identify the needs to be met by a new landscape: Is it for shade, color, vegetables or curb appeal? Is it the whole property or just a new bed?

Once you have identified your goals, the second step is to design the hardscape: drain lines, sidewalks, patios, fences, pools and retaining walls. Which spaces will be street-facing, and which will be private? It is quick and easy to take a copy of the plot plan and make enlargements on which to doodle. I took a screenshot from Google Earth, printed it out and then copied it to scale on graph paper. Of course, if you are doing major construction, your landscape architect or designer will do this for you, or you can use an app on the computer. Make several copies so you can try different ideas.

Next, identify any important assets that already exist. For our new place, the plants I will work with include a teenage cherry tree, a mangled Kousa dogwood (salvageable with fresh pruning), a magnificent middle-aged, fire-enginered maple, a couple of established viburnums and a backdrop of evergreen pines and spruces. There is a lovely gazebo in the common area beyond my space, and I will work to not cover up that view. There are no windows that need privacy to worry about. This garden is small, so I will pay more attention to the details.

Before winter set in, I designed a new major planting area that runs from edge to edge in the back and curves gracefully along the remaining lawn panel. Two truckloads of compost and two more of natural brown mulch later, and I have more than 1,000 square feet ready for spring planting. I also put in a new holding bed between the sidewalk and the side of the house as my propagation and transplant spot. We have the first appointment with the irrigation specialists in the spring to extend the existing system into the new beds.

Take a good look now at the bones of your own garden in the winter, and imagine how you might improve upon them. Follow along with me this spring as I sort through planning specific spaces, sourcing new plants and placing beloved transplants from the old garden. In the meantime, curl up with some hot tea and your plant catalogues, and dream a little. ln

February17

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