Create Your Own Landscape Design

Landscape planning and design isn't difficult. It takes time, but not artistic talent, and not creativity. Do what professional landscape designers do: borrow other people's ideas. Gardens are personal, and should reflect your lifestyle and interests. If you like to barbecue for friends, plan a barbecue area with shady places to sit. If you like to sunbathe in the nude, plan some privacy hedges around a sunny spot. It's that simple.

Interview Yourself: The first step in landscape design is to find out more about the client. What do you want to have in your yard? What do you need to have?

• Play area?
  


• Dog run?
  


• Fountain or pond?
  


• Vegetable or herb garden?
  


• Outdoor entertaining spot?
  

What do you need to hide from you or others?

• Boats?
  


• Your sunbathing spot?
  


• Your trash cans?
  


• The neighbor's trashcans?
  


• A sewage treatment plant?
  

Let Your Scissors Do the Planning

This is the best part, because there is no work to it, and it's almost free. Go through magazines and newspapers, clipping out pictures of gardens or garden features that appeal to you. Clip lots of pictures. They may be a way to hide trash cans, a cute flowerpot, or a magnificent dining terrace. Sit on the sofa, sip a seasonally appropriate beverage and snip away. Sort the clippings into plants, outdoor living, garden decor, or whatever sorting scheme makes sense to you.

Don't worry about how to pay for that terrace. These are just ideas. Don't worry whether the plants shown in the pictures will grow in your area, because you can usually find something that can create a similar effect for your climate. A neighbor wanted a "knot garden" full of herbs.  He also wanted the herbs to be bordered with the traditional short boxwood hedge. Well, herbs were no problem, but true boxwood in Arizona is impossible. He substituted a drought-tolerant shrub that could be sheared like boxwood to get the effect he wanted.

Also, go to your library and check out books about gardening, landscaping, and architecture. Do not cut pictures out of the library books! Make a digital snapshot, a scan, or a photocopy of any pictures that appeal to you. Borrow books from friends too.