Plot Planning: 5 Common Mistakes

When planning a garden, we often rely on our neighbors’ ideas and intuition without understanding basic design principles, making it easy to make mistakes. «Think before you act,» as the proverb says. But garden planning is not so simple: it requires considerable knowledge and careful consideration, including all aspects of purchasing, installation, and planting. Instructors at the modern gardening course «Yellow Wheelbarrow» will introduce the most common mistakes in garden planning.

In many ways.

Too much variety in plants and materials – I saw what I liked and planted it where there was space. To create a unified style, landscape architects suggest choosing a limited list of plants and using it at the time of purchase. Don’t go to the plant fair if you don’t have this list, advises Vaida Vaitkutė-Eidimtienė. Create a garden not spontaneously, but carefully. Resist collecting plant species, as it is difficult to create a beautiful, coherent image from many different plants. Choose a smaller number of types, colors, shapes, combine them with each other. Plant plants in groups, not scattered one by one.

The proportions in the texture are not maintained.

The proportions of the plot, if violated, are often not even noticed: we understand that something is wrong, and that’s it. When planting plants near the house, it is necessary to take into account the architecture and dimensions. A large and tall tree is not suitable for a small plot near a low house, because the house will look like a dwarf. And small plants are not suitable for a tall house, because the house will seem disproportionately gigantic. Even with regards to plants it is necessary to maintain proportions. Do not multiply conifers: by themselves they make the plot boring and static. Deciduous trees enliven and introduce dynamism at different times of the year.

Too much lawn.

Let’s talk about proportions again. A common case: almost the entire plot is sown with grass, on the edges thuja hedgeand in one place a small low flowerbed or rock garden. Lots of lawn, few other plants: this means too much flat space and too few volumetric elements. Courtyards should be more lush, more vertical elements, small architectural structures, notes Goda Characiejienė, teacher of the «Yellow Wheelbarrow» course. I wait requires intensive care, but does not give the garden a face or character.

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Landscape designer Sandra Kanapeckaitė suggests in her courses to leave the lawn only as much as is really necessary, because it requires intensive care: mowing, fertilizing, weeding, spraying. If you do not walk to the farthest part of the site, it is better to plant it with sedges, hillocks or other undemanding perennials.

Excessive control of nature.

A common goal is to create a tidy, even barren, garden. For example, a large area of ​​weed-free lawn, high-maintenance plants, precisely shaped trees. And in vain, because nature is not an interior. Exaggerated decorativeness, a clean environment seems lifeless, synthetic, it is necessary to leave the freshness of nature. Take your time to sweep away every fallen leaf, leave at least a feeling of free nature. There must be order and structure in the garden, but the filling could often be more natural.

5. Pre-existing conditions are not considered.

If you choose plants based on beauty alone, it’s natural to sometimes miss the mark. Then it happens that the colored leaves turn green, the dry-loving ones rot in clay soil and the sun-loving ones do not bloom in the shade. Vaida Vaitkutė-Eidimtienė he says plants are often planted haphazardly without considering the conditions those plants require. It is not suitable to plant perennial flowers that require both wet and dry conditions nearby – some will certainly wither. It is not optimal to place plants that love soil with a different acidity, for example, rhododendrons in the center of the flower garden. Canopy plants planted in a sunny place can burn, dry out, change color. Plants must be selected and combined based on the solar regime, based on the soil, acidity, based on the need for water. And only then according to beauty.

The article was published on the Delfi Manonamai.lt portal on 15 October 2014. The photos were used by this publication.

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There are even more examples and photos of what the most common errors look like in this video

Land planning and design: we learn together with a specialist in the courses «My garden design». They are organized several times a year in major cities. They are intended for amateurs who want to design the spaces of their land in a comfortable and elegant way. The groups are small, everyone works on their own plot plans. We invite you to register to get closer to the construction site of your dreams and avoid mistakes.