If you have been thinking about how you would like to cut your home energy costs, you might want to take a second look at your home landscaping. This is an area you may not have even thought of.

Did you know energy-efficient home landscaping can reduce your household’s energy consumption for heating and cooling by as much as 25 percent.!That’s staggering, isn’t it? Proper placement of trees, shrubs, vines, grasses, and hedges lets you modify the microclimate around your home to maximize shade during the summer and reduce wind chill during the winter.

Energy-efficient home landscaping is one of the best investments you can make, because aside from its potential to increase the resale value of your property, it can generate enough savings to return your initial investment in less than eight years. It is not surprising then that more homeowners than ever are implementing energy-conserving home landscaping ideas on their property.

So where can we begin with this exciting new landscaping adventure? I hope the following information will be of help to you. Develop a Home Landscaping Plan for Energy Efficiency There are countless home landscaping strategies for energy conservation, but not all of them may be appropriate for your property and climate zone.

 Before you plant those evergreens in your backyard, make an assessment of the comfort and energy shortcomings of your current home landscaping. Things like the property’s microclimate, house location, and the presence of surrounding structures will influence your energy-efficient home landscaping plan. Microclimate is the climate immediately surrounding your home, and along with the regional climate, it helps determine which plants and trees will thrive and provide the best energy-saving benefit to your home landscaping.

Your home’s location affects your dwelling’s exposure to the sun, wind, and water, consequently shaping your home landscaping needs. Nearby buildings, walls, trees, and bodies of water can produce significant climatic effects that would impact your home landscaping strategies. A thorough analysis of your property’s features enables you to devise an energy-efficient home landscaping scheme that addresses your needs and goals.

Landscape to Maximize Shade Properly planned home landscaping can reduce your air-conditioning costs in the summer by providing shade from the hot morning and afternoon sun. Deciduous trees (trees that shed their leaves in winter) provide shade in the summer when its leaves are in full bloom and warm the home in winter by letting low-angle winter sun filter through its bare branches.

Home landscaping that maximizes shade can reduce temperature inside the home by as much as 8 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit. Would you think of shading your air-conditioner through home landscaping because that increases the unit’s efficiency. In addition, shading the ground and pavement with trees, shrubs, and groundcover plants reduces surrounding air temperatures.

Other heat-reducing home landscaping ideas include building a trellis for climbing vines to shade a patio and planting a row of shrubs to shade a driveway. Landscaspe for Wind Protection Home landscaping to divert the flow of cold winds helps cut down your home heating costs in the winter.

Trees, shrubs, bushes, walls, and fences make effective windbreaks for winter-protected home landscaping. You can achieve adequate wind protection through home landscaping by planting evergreen trees and shrubs along the north and northwest areas of your property. Windbreaks can decrease wind speed for a distance as much as 30 times its height, although maximum wind protection occurs at a distance of two to five times the mature height of windbreaks.

For optimal wind protection, make sure that the foliage density on the windward side of your property is 60 percent. A well-designed home landscaping provides energy savings year-round. Enjoy the warmth of the winter sun by not planting evergreens too close to the south side of your home.

Shrubs, bushes and vines planted close to your house create dead air spaces that insulate your home in both winter and summer. I hope this article has been of help to you in creating landscaping for energy conservation. Reducing my household energy consumption by a possible 25% has motivated me to start looking around my yard.

The Foundation For Your Landscape Ideas

Whether you plan on “borrowing ideas” or plan on creating your own landscaping design, you should have at the very least a basic understanding of the principles of landscape design.

This doesn’t mean that you have to apply every principle to every part of your plan. But just having an understanding of these principles will help you generate ideas and increase your creativity.

Great landscaping lies in the eyes of the its creator. So, while the principles of landscape design are great guidelines to follow, don’t feel like they’re the “have to rules” of landscaping. Abstract and creativity are allowed.

Unity should be one of your main goals in your design. It may be better understood and applied as consistency and repetition. Repetition creates unity by repeating alike elements like plants, plant groups, or decor throughout the landscape. Consistency creates unity in the sense that some or all of the different elements of the landscape fit together to create a whole.

Unity can be achieved by the consistency of character of elements in the design. By character, I mean the height, size, texture, color schemes, etc. of different elements.

A good example would be in the use of accent boulders. If you’ve ever seen a landscape design that had one large white round boulder here and another large red square granite boulder there and so on, then you’ve seen that unity wasn’t created by this specific element.

This is just one example but the principle applies to all other elements such as groups of plants and materials.

A simple way to create unity in your landscape is by creating themes. And one of the simplest ways to create themes is by using a little garden decor or garden statues. Creating a theme garden is easier when it’s related to something you’re interested in or have a passion for.

If you’re into butterflies for instance, you could create a theme using plants that attract butterflies as well as using statues, ornaments, and other decor that are related to butterflies.

Unity should be expressed through at least one element in your landscape and preferably more. Using elements to express a main idea through consistent style and a specific theme is what creates harmony.

Simplicity is actually one of the principles in design and art. It’s one of the best guidelines you can follow as a beginner or do it yourselfer. Just keep things simple to begin with. You can do more later.

Simplicity in planting, for instance, would be to pick two or three colors and repeat them throughout the garden or landscape. Keeping decor to a minimum and within a specific theme as well as keeping hardscapes such as boulders consistent is also practicing simplicity.

Balance in design is just as the word implies. Equality. There are basically two types of balance in landscape design. Symmetrical and Asymmetrical.

Symmetrical balance is where there are more or less equally spaced matching elements of the garden design. With a garden equally divided, both sides could share the same shape, form, plant height, plant groupings, colors, bed shapes, theme, etc.

You may remember creating something like this when you were a kid in art class at school. Where you take a piece of paper, splash paint on it, fold it in half, unfold it, and then it magically creates an interesting symmetrical design. So symmetrical balance or design is somewhat of a mirror image or reflection.

Asymmetrical balance on the other hand is one of the principles of landscape design that’s a little more complex. While textures, forms, colors, etc. may remain constant to create some unity, shapes and hardscapes may be more random. This form of balance often has separate or different themes with each having an equal but different type of attraction.

A good example of this would be where bed shapes or paths differ on both sides of the dividing line. One side could be curvy with a sense of flow while the other side is straight, direct, and hard.

This can also create a neat contrast. Flowing lines are pleasing to the eye but the bold contrast of a curve with a straight line can be very interesting.

Asymmetrical balance isn’t necessarily limited to just the shape of your garden.

An example might be where one side of the garden is mostly large shade trees while the other side is predominately a lower growing flower garden or even a mix of both examples. This is only limited to your imagination.

Contrast and harmony can also be achieved using plants. Fine foliage verses coarser foliage, round leaves verses spiked leaves as well as color compliments and contrasts.

Plant height, color, and texture may be varied from one area to the next but each area should stay consistent within its own theme.

You’ll hear me talk about “themes” a lot. Many successful do it yourself designs follow a basic theme to achieve most of the principles of landscape design described on this page. The proper use of plants and garden decor or a mix of both is a simple way to achieve themes.

Color adds the dimension of real life and interest to the landscape. Bright colors like reds, yellows and oranges seem to advance toward you and can actually make an object seem closer to you. Cool colors like greens, blues, and pastels seem to move away from you and can make an object seem farther from you.

Grays, blacks, and whites are considered neutral colors and are best used in the background with bright colors in the foreground. However, to increase depth in a landscape, you can use dark and coarse textured plants in the foreground and use fine textured and light colored plants in the background.

Colors can also be used to direct your attention to a specific area of the garden. A bright display among cooler colors would naturally catch the eye.

Natural transition can be applied to avoid radical or abrupt changes in your landscape design. Transition is basically gradual change. It can best be illustrated in terms of plant height or color but can also be applied to all elements in the landscape including but not limited to textures, foliage shape or size, and the size and shape of different elements.

In other words transition can be achieved by the gradual, ascending or descending, arrangement of different elements with varying textures, forms, colors, or sizes.

An example of a good transition would be a stair step effect from large trees to medium trees to shrubs to bedding plants. This example is where a little knowledge of proper plant selection would come in handy.

Transition is one of the principles of landscape design that can be used to “create illusions” in the landscape. For example a transition from taller to shorter plants can give a sense of depth and distance (like in a painting), making the garden seem larger than it really is. A transition from shorter to taller plants could be used to frame a focal point to make it stand out and seem closer than it really is.

Line is of the more structural principles of landscape design. It can mostly be related to the way beds, walkways, and entryways move and flow.

Straight lines are forceful and direct while curvy lines have a more natural, gentle, flowing effect.

Proportion simply refers to the size of elements in relation to each other. Of all the principles of landscape design, this one is quite obvious but still requires a little thought and planning. Most of the elements in landscape design can be intentionally planned to meet the proper proportions.

For instance if you are creating a small courtyard garden, an enormous seven foot garden statue placed in the center would be way out of proportion and a little tacky to say the least. Or a small four foot waterfall and pond placed in the center of a large open yard would get lost in the expanse.

Don’t misunderstand this to mean that if you have a large yard you can’t have smaller features or garden decor. Proportion is relative and elements can be scaled to fit by creating different rooms in the garden. The goal is to create a pleasing relationship among the three dimensions of length, breadth, and depth or height.

A small water feature can be proportionate if placed in a corner or on the edge of a large area and becomes a focal point of the larger area while creating its own distinct atmosphere. An entire room, sitting area, or theme can be created around it. Other rooms and themes can be created as well. See small gardens for ideas on creating rooms and creating illusions.

Also, special consideration and study should be given to proper plant selection to avoid using plants that are out of proportion.

Repetition is directly related to unity. Its good to have a variety of elements and forms in the garden but repeating these elements gives variety expression.

Unity is achieved by repeating objects or elements that are alike. Too many unrelated objects can make the garden look cluttered and unplanned.

There’s a fine line here. It’s possible that too much of one element can make a garden or landscape feel uninteresting, boring and monotonous.

However, unity can still be created by using several different elements repeatedly. This in turn keeps the garden interesting.

Help with your front yard landscape design or back yard landscape design!  Check it out!

Good garden design starts with thinking before digging.

Garden design takes time. It’s too late to plan your garden when you are standing in the nursery eyeing every new plant that tempts you. Spend some time looking at your garden site, either during the off season, when you can really view it objectively or during the growing season, when your successes and failures make themselves known.

Once you have an idea of how you are going to use your garden, come back to reality and take an objective look at the site before you come up with your garden design. This is of utmost importance in determining which plants and trees you use to achieve the desired effect.

Monitor it during different times of the day and year:

1. How many hours of sun does the site receive?
2. What times of day is it sunny?
3. Does sun exposure change with the seasons? Do trees allow sun in the spring and shade during summer?
4. How is the soil, as far as pH and texture?
5. Are there structures or large trees that will affect plant growth and selection?
6. Are there structures nearby that you would like to camouflage?
7. What plants are already growing there?

You know what you want to use your garden for, what you are working with and what resources you can devote to it. Now, what do you want it to look like?

Formal or informal? Wild?
Should it complement your house?
Do you want it to flow with the natural landscape?
Do you favor soft pastels or bold tropicals?

All these things might seem overwhelming, but you’ll be saving yourself a lot of time and a considerable amount of money if you take this advice and you’ll find that each step gets easier and more fun. Plant selection should be one of the last things you consider, or you may be overwhelmed trying to create a garden design to accommodate the dozens (or hundreds or even thousands) of plants you crave.

Know your planting zone

Before you buy that first plant, you have to know what your planting zone is. Without that knowledge, you can end up ordering all sorts of wonderful looking plants and shrubs only to find that they are not suitable for your planting zone and they will die. You will have spent time and money needlessly. If you’re buying by catalog or online, every plant and seed catalog or online merchant should show a planting zone map and each plant depicted should have an indication of the zones in which that particular plant (or tree, etc.) will thrive. You can also contact your local garden clubs or your county’s Agriculture Extension Bureau with your questions regarding the suitability and care of plants for your particular area. This knowledge is of critical importance, particularly if you have moved from one zone to another. Not only will you save money, but you will avoid countless hours of frustrating work in your garden.

Keep in mind what your garden will be used for and when. This is important in your plant consideration. If you plan to entertain a lot and don’t want to spend all summer on chores, look for lower maintenance plants that don’t require constant deadheading and staking to look good and, if you are planting for small children, choose plants that will bloom at their eye level, with interesting textures and scents and non-poisonous flowers and seeds.

Make a list of the plants you like and group them by color, texture and form – the garden design triumvirate. Also chart them by season of bloom and/or interest. Consider both flowers and foliage. There are more and more plants being bred with colorful foliage that will provide interest in the garden all season.

Be sure to include some large anchor plants that will look good all year. These are usually shrubs and often evergreens. Most small to average gardens can only accommodate 1 or 2 trees or shrubs, but they are important for providing the good bones of the garden and you want to choose wisely at the beginning. Trees and shrubs can be very difficult and heavy to move around.

Planting bulbs for added beauty

A wonderful way to use bulbs effectively is to naturalize daffodils in a wooded area or group them for colorful accent around evergreen shrubs. High quality Dutch flower bulbs can be ordered online from reputable catalogers and merchants who will advise you as to what’s appropriate for your zone.

Plan ahead when planting bulbs; i.e., for spring flowering you plant in the Fall. Follow directions accompanying your bulbs regarding depth (usually six inches) and fertilizer (there are special bulb fertilizers that should be put in the planting holes). An important reminder – again: Know your planting zone before ordering any bulbs. They all look so beautiful in the catalogs,but what grows well in the midwest, in most instances, will not grow in South Florida! Special tools for planting bulbs are also available online. They make digging holdes so much easier than using a simple trowel. Check them out.

Landscape Ideas For Your Home or Business

Hey Roby here,

Are you looking for landscape ideas for your home or business. I am a Realtor by trade and this is my uncensored review of what I really think about Landscaping4Home.

Why am I writing this.  Well, like many of you, I had been searching for something to enhance personal home and assist my clients with ideas for a quite some time.  I had also spent countless dollars on books and pictures. Except for some text books I kept from some landscape design classes I took, nothing I purchased included materials that covered Landscape Design suitable for both beginners and advanced landscape professionals.

While we all know there is no perfect product, once you find one that you feel comes very close, you certainly want to share it.  In my business, referrals are my lifeblood. So, when I find something or someone worth referring, I make an effort to do so. 

Why do I think Landscaping 4 Home is superior?

It contains, exclusive Membership containing more than 120+ step-by-step landscaping design ideas video tutorials.

• Over 4200 Front Yard Landscaping Ideas
• High Quality Front Yard Lanscaping Pictures
• FREE Updates
• Suitable for beginners and advanced landscaping projects
• 60 Day Money Back Guarantee
• Become an expert at residential landscaping and commerical landscaping

“Many of These Landscaping Ideas Can Be Done In A Weekend…”

You will learn how to enhance your home’s exterior with stylish furniture, lighting fixtures and more. Make the ideal landscape to complement your home – complete with gazebos and pools, slopes and grades, fencing , plants and trees.  

Getting ideas to landscape your home shouldn’t be a problem. Landscaping4Home has a style for nearly every climate, country, trend, fascination, art form, era, and you name it.  You will be landscaping yards in no time at all.

I have been doing this for a few years now and I have helped many people enhance the value of their property as well as enjoy the process.

Here is one of the reviews:

“…We saved time and money…”

“We purchased this product based on a recommendation from a friend of mine since we recently moved into a new home with nothing in our backyard. We were planning to do a patio and planting beds in our backyard.

Landcaping4Home assisted us in the planning process. We saved time and money by using just a couple of designs from your enormous gallery of ideas.

Thank you for recommending this amazing product!

With gratitude,
Michelle & Mike Pierson”

Want to learn how to landscape design like this? CLICK  here.

Information Courtesy of Landscape Ideas and Developing Landscape Plans

To be sure, drafting landscape plans is no child’s play; creating landscape plans requires thorough site analysis and needs assessment and may demand more than a rudimentary knowledge of landscaping. But its benefits, such as its potential to avert possible hazards or costly last-minute changes, make the task of developing landscape plans well worth the effort. When embarking on the project of developing landscapes, it is best to follow a step-by-step approach. Following a step-wise process when developing landscape plans allows you to break down the endeavor into easily manageable tasks and minimize mistakes along the way. Furthermore, creating landscape plans allows you to stay within budget and stick to a reasonable timetable.

To See the Steps, visit Landscape Ideas and Developing Landscape Plans

Landscaping Business Startup Ideas

Below is a list of items you need to be aware of and things you should seek help.

• Choosing a name -Tips and ideas to get you started with that professional name.
• What equipment to purchase - Vehicle, trailers, mowers, trimmers, blowers, edgers, and other items for starting a lawn care business.
• Equipment maintenance - How to and when to service equipment.
• Upselling other services - A must. If you’re not doing this, you’re losing major cash.
• Grass types -Learn which grasses exist in certain parts of the country.
• Fertilizers - Valuable knowledge of fertilizers.
• Aeration - It’s like pulling money from the ground. Most customers need this service.
• Cutting Efficiency -Save loads of time with these tips.
• Landing corporate accounts - Don’t be afraid of the big businesses. It’s easier than you think.
• Residential accounts - Build your business fast.
• How to bid residential and commercial accounts -Tactics for establishing rates.
• How to get the best commercial accounts – They’re right around the corner.
• How to keep customers - Opening up the lines of communication.
• How to properly bill your customers - Don’t waste too much time collecting your money. Do it this way!
• Advertising - Business cards, door hangers, flyers, classifieds, websites.
• Insurance - Learn what types you need and don’t need.
• Accounting - Choosing the right professional.
• Legal issues -Know this before you start any business. It could save you.
• Trade magazines -Keep up to date with equipment and articles. Subscribe to these!
• Lawn equipment suppliers -Buy as little as possible from the dealers. Magazines you should know about.

Landscape businesses, if done right, can be very profitable and are pretty much recession proof.  Builders, commerical property managers and home owners are always looking for landscape ideas and labor to complete the job.  Why not you?  I work with some local companies and they do very well.  One of the keys is to start off on the right foot.

If you don’t already have a mentor or someone in landscaping already, I recommend you look at ‘How To Start a Lawn Care Business’.

Landscape Ideas For Your Home or Business

You can enhance your home’s exterior with stylish furniture, lighting fixtures and more. Make the ideal landscape to complement your home – complete with gazebos and pools, slopes and grades, fencing , plants and trees.

Getting ideas to landscape your home shouldn’t be a problem. Whether it be front yard landscape ideas or backyard landscape ideas, Landscaping For Your Home has a style for nearly every climate, country, trend, fascination, art form, era, and you name it.

I do believe there are more landscaping ideas pictures and themes than you could possibly go through. If you simply want to browse through photos of design or just look for ideas for a certain style, you will really enjoy the lanscaping pictures and gallery offered here.

Whether you already have a detailed garden design in mind or want a landscaper to create your landscape from his own experience, the finished product will be a living extension of your home and a gentle lure that brings you outside to enjoy the eye catching landscape you have built.

The increased value added to your property will also be an added plus making your decision and investment all worthwhile.

Whether it be front yard landscaping or back yard lanscaping, there are many choices to be made.  If you love, as I do, starting with a vision and seeing it through to completion, is gratifying and makes the process easy and enjoyable.

Get all the ideas you will ever need for your home or business with Landscaping For Your Home

Landscaping Ideas Even You Can Implement

Front Yard Landscape Design #1 – Decorative Borders

Do you have a mediocre front yard? You can make it much more attractive simply by adding some decorative edging or borders. For instance, if you have several flower beds that all blend together, you could set them off with some attractive stone edging. You can do the same thing where the lawn meets the beds.

Keep in mind that edging products come in a wide variety of materials (there are a lot more than the basic black plastic that many use by default).

Front Yard Landscape Design #2 – Plant Some Annuals

Annuals are plants that only live for a year.

It’s true that you have to replace annuals each year. So the key is to only use them sparingly. You don’t want an entire yard full of annuals because it would be too much work to replace them each year. But annuals are among the most colorful and beautiful of all plants, so they can really add a nice punch of color appeal to your front yard landscape arrangement.

Front Yard Landscape Design #3 – Freshen Up Mulch

Nothing livens up a yard like fresh mulch around trees and in the flower beds. Mulch will break down from sun, wind and rain. It also gets scattered and overcome with weeds. Quickly and easily spruce of your front yard simply by replacing the old mulch with new mulch.  Just a layer of about two inches on top of the old mulch is all it takes. So this front yard landscaping idea is both easy and cost-effective.

Front Yard Landscape Design #4- Plant Some Trees

This landscaping idea is especially useful if your front yard currently lacks trees. A yard devoid of trees has a “blank canvas” sort of a look. But trees offer more than just visual appeal. They also provide shade that can be a nice touch in the dog days of summer!

A first rate landscaping design needs good observation and design skills. A well-designed landscape can add splendor to your home. It can also increase the worth of your property. Landscaping design ideas differ from simple front yard landscaping to complex theme-based landscaping ideas like desert landscaping or oriental landscaping. Landscaping design practices mainly cope with improving the aesthetic appeal of land. You can drive through many neighborhoods to see wonderful ideas on what you might want to do.

Lawn andscape ideas feature art and science. A home or property and its landscaping should be pleasant with each other. Gardening is the most important facet of landscaping design because plants and flowers can give an improved and pleasurable look for a particular area.  Your options for plants and flowers are often dictated by your local climate. You can easily design a landscaping garden relying on your individual style that is unique and pleasant. Prior to getting into a landscaping, you should be aware of accessible space and what methods will best work for your landscaping.

There are different formal and informal methods of garden landscaping. Formal landscaping includes geometric designs and straight line designs. Formal designs are usually well-planned and give a professional appearance. The informal landscaping comprises curved lines and it is perfect for small gardens. An informal style landscaping plan provides random collection of plants and flowers. The oriental landscaping is useful in large gardening projects. The oriental style includes use of different accessories such as water, rocks, potted plans and evergreens. The woodland style landscaping is an elaborate alternative of landscaping. It perfectly suits backyard landscaping design with artificial waterfall and woodland plants.

Front yard landscaping designs are more fit for home landscaping and these are most utilized type of landscaping. You can beautify your front yard in several styles and designs. applying shrubs on the boundaries of front yard will add beauty to your landscape. You can also use different decorative lights, craft pathways and borders to your landscape design. If you are living in a desert area, you can use desert plants and soil for designing your front yard. Use stone design techniques in landscaping will give a very natural and rugged appeal to your land.

If you have a big landscaping plan, it is good to receive advice from a professional landscapers.  Some garden and lawn centers can also help you in giving good landscaping ideas. Professional home improvement centers typically have knowledgeable sales personnel who are familiar in different landscaping methods. Before you spend money on landscaping, be sure to receive good landscaping advice from a trusted source like one offering these thousands of frontyard and backyard landscape design ideas.

You can look for different landscaping design ideas online. Various online magazines provide informative articles on landscaping designs. If you correctly plan and perform a perfect idea, you can create a landscape that is uniquely different from others around you.  Do it Yourself landscaping is fun and very rewarding.

There’s an old saying that states something like – “Getting Started Is Half Finished”. And so many times I find this to be true as I see do it yourself landscapers struggle to find their initial design idea. However, once they establish a framework of necessary design elements, it usually goes pretty smooth from there.  Need Help getting started.  Check out Landscape Ideas for your home.

It’s not surprising that the most common landscape design question that I get is – “where do I begin?” or “how do I start my design?”. I know it can be difficult. And especially if you don’t have a vision for your lanscape design.

So where do you begin? How do you start your landscape or garden design? 

While every landscape design is different and every designer follows a set of rules and principles, I find that most do it yourselfers all have the greatest success from using the same starting point. Begin by laying down any paths, driveways, access routes, or walk areas that might be needed. And also create access to any areas that you may plan on creating. In many designs, this will help to establish a framework that you can simply design around.

Of course, this won’t be applicable in all lanscape designs as many don’t require any access or travel. So take and use this advice where and if you can.  You can also get great ideas from Front Yard Landscape Ideas for Your Home.

Paths and walkways can accomplish many functions in your landscape or garden. Their main function, of course, is to create a designated space for people to walk on.

However, in design and as an aid to design, their function could be to guide your visitors to, through, or away from some other area in the garden. Also, they’re a great way to break up a vast expanse of lawn, meadow, or bed area.

First, let’s look at walkways, paths, and such as necessary elements.

Walkways are needed to guide visitors or yourself to and from another area. Observe that almost every home has a walkway leading to the front door, which is, of course, where most folks want to invite guests to come. So walks, whether refined (brick, flagstone, etc.) or primitive (gravel, mulch, etc.), are necessary to “guide” or “lead” visitors to, through, or away from an area.

So where are the necessary areas where you need other walkways or access? Maybe from the back door to the alley where you dump the trash. Or from the house to the pool area. Or from the pool area to the kids play area or the outdoor cooking area. You get the picture.

In a landscape design sense.

Establishing walk, drive, and access areas will in turn help to create borders and boundaries. Once you have your walkways laid out, you can simply design a lot of the landscaping around them. The same goes with driveways and parking areas as well. You can plant beds on either or both sides of a walk or use a walkway as an edge to create borders.

Keep it interesting if you can.

If you were to, for instance, plan to place a sitting area at the back of the garden. Of course you would need some type of path for you and your guests to get there. However, instead of plotting a straight path, why not create a winding tour through other interesting areas of the garden on the way there?

Curves and winding paths do more than just create interest. They can also create an illusion of more space, distance, and travel. This is especially useful in creating small gardens and landscapes.

Once you lay down walkways, driveways, and access areas, you’ll have a good starting framework for the rest of the design. Now, simply design around them.  If you need some help with your Landscape plans and to see great landscaping pictures, check out Landscaping For Your Home.