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Water Features

After the Great Recession, few homeowners were willing to spend big bucks on ponds, streams and waterfalls. But, like all landscaping trends (and based on what’s happening in the economy), ponds are making a big comeback. And for smaller landscapes, especially in busy urban areas, pond-less water falls and bubblers help mask or at least distract from street noise.

Annuals

Every time your clients visit a public garden in summer, like Cantigny in Wheaton, or the Chicago Botanic Garden, they’re exposed to sun-loving, eye-popping annuals. They want that color and they want it to last. “We had clients asking if we could put off our fall maintenance in November because they still had blooms,” said Sharon Marrin of Bret-Mar Landscape in Homer Glen. For clients leery about spending extra bucks on something that “only” lasts summer through fall, work in a small area of annuals around a patio or a front entry or in pots to get them interested in seasonal color.

Your source for Midwest native seed mixes and live plants

Specializing in plants & seed mixes for

• Solar panel arrays

• Pollinator habitat

• Wetland mitigations

• DOT & roadside corridors

• Pipeline & transmission corridors

• Stormwater BMPs & rain gardens

• Habitat & ecosystem restoration

Stantec Native Plant Nursery

574-586-2412 email: nurserysales@stantec.com

Hydrangeas

They’re not going anywhere. There are countless cultivars of several species and you can expect to see more of these wildly popular plants coming to a nursery near you.

Meditation Garden

There are many definitions for the word “zen.” It’s been described as ‘a state of calm attentiveness in which one’s actions are guided by intuition rather than by conscious effort’. The pandemic forced people outdoors, to their patios and decks, where they could recharge. This particular zen-like stroll garden might have the neighbors wondering when the homeowners are out walking in circles, but, let’s just say, hey, it’s all about the design.