We all know the saying April showers bring May flowers. So, let’s start thinking about DIY landscaping for our home or office. There are so many variables in do-it-yourself landscaping, such as budget, skills, the climate in the Chicago region, and your personal design taste, but there are certain steps you can take to make your yard look fabulous.
Good landscape designs are anchored by focal points. One of the hottest trends is to use water features as a focal point. Water features are not only visually appealing but add soothing sounds. Using pre-formed rigid plastic liners, durable pumps, flexible tubing, and cheap fountains, they’re also a lot easier to install than you think.
Plants for all Seasons
Make sure you’re planting something of interest in each of the four seasons. Do-it-yourself landscaping for all the seasons begins with a well-researched plant-selection plan. The goal is to have flowering trees and/or shrubs throughout spring and summer, fall foliage in autumn, and good structure for the winter months. Otherwise, if all the flowers bloom at the same time, they’ll look attractive during that time frame but will lack color for the rest of the year.
You may want to group plants according to their water needs. Grouping vegetation with similar watering needs into specific hydrozones reduces water use and protects the plants from both underwatering and overwatering by allowing you to water to each zone’s specific needs.
Many DIY landscaping tips focus on deciduous trees and shrubs but don’t forget evergreens and other plants for their foliage as for their flowers. Evergreen shrubs retain their leaves or needles all year long, so they’re constantly providing cover and color.
Build a Berm
One way to add pizzazz to the landscape is to build a berm, a mound that you can cover with a rock or flower garden. Berms add color and texture to an otherwise flat, plain lawn with colored stone, flowers, or foliage. They can also add height by being built as a mound. You can place them anywhere, although they’re especially effective in corners of the lawn.
Perennials and Annuals
Light and soil requirements should always be considered before deciding which types of flowers to buy for your yard. Carefully matching the types of flowers you will be growing with space where they’ll be growing is important to follow in do-it-yourself landscaping.
Perennial flowers are wonderful for your planting beds, but they bloom for only so long. You may have perennials blooming in your bed in May, then nothing until July. Incorporating annuals into your landscaping plan will fill the gaps, giving you continuous color in the yard.
Landscape Lights
Attractive landscaping deserves to be seen after hours, which is where landscape lights come into play. The lights play many roles, from adding to the home’s attractiveness to illuminating steps and sidewalks for safety to showcasing points of interest in the landscape. Placing lights alongside paths and walkways is one of their most common uses, although that doesn’t mean they have to be set in straight lines at prescribed intervals.