Shade Tolerant Trees for Intimate Gardens in Grand Rapids, Michigan

Let me introduce you to some of my favorite shade friendly trees for Intimate Gardens in Michigan.  I prefer using dwarf varieties of trees in most home landscapes because they tend to stay within the bounds of typical gardens.  You should always consider the mature size of any plant you install in your landscape.  Landscapes are often overwhelmed by trees and shrubs that become overgrown.

Japanese Maples such as the above Crimson Queen Maple bring significant interest from spring through fall. Whatever the size of your landscape, there is one that will fit your gardens.   You will be amazed at the color options.  Bright reds, maroons, chartreuse, variegated.  The shape of the leaves vary dramatically too. Deeply lobed with serrated edges to broad and smooth.  So, whether you enjoy the broader view or exploring the details, Japanese Maples are for you. 

Acer palmatum 'Okagami' is stunning dwarf upright Japanese Maple whose Burgundy wine colored leaves contrast beautifully with the white/ grey bark.

The Golden Hinoki False Cypress - Chamaecyparis obtusa 'Nana Lutea' has a glow about it.  The contrasting deep green of older needles acts as a foil for the newer golden needles. The texture of this dwarf tree creates is reminiscent  of billowing clouds or lush woodland moss.

Another Hinoki False Cypress, 'Nana Gracilis', adds interesting texture with its flat fan like branching habit.  This compact tree is an excellent choice for small gardens and set against walls and fences. Try it with Scarlet Carpet Roses and 'Little Bunny' grass.

For very narrow areas or to emphasis the entrance to a garden or pathway, or even in an urn, check out Chamaecyparis obtuse 'Spiralis'.  An excellent small tree for small gardens. 

To see these trees and a large variety of unique garden trees in West Michigan, check out Blue Horizon Nursery - 09721 59th St. Grand Junction, MI 49056. Check them out online at http://bluehorizonnursery.com/?page=home.  Tell Bill Brent Langley sent you.

East Grand Rapids Outdoor Living Space Walkthru

This East Grand Rapids, MI landscape was designed to encourage the home owners to live more often in their outdoor living space.  Wood burning fire pit. Unilock paver patio. Stepping stone passes through a crushed stone transition walkway between the main lower paver patio and the upper paver patio.  Future gardens are planned to finish off the landscape and soften the edges and water features to add sound to the newly landscaped back yard.

Call or Text Brent NOW

(616) 328-3258

Your Outdoor Living Space and Intimate Garden Transformation is One Call Away

2017 Outdoor Living - Boston Road East Grand Rapids

I have wrapped up the patio area of the Boston Road outdoor living space project in East Grand Rapids, MI.   For the paver patio, I used Belgard's new smooth/ crisp Cotswold Mist Moduline series large format pavers with Black Diamond accents.Wellington Wall was used for window well and fire pit with the 48"x14" natural gas American Fire Glass stainless steel pan. The fire pit cap is Techo-Bloc's Piedmonte in Onyx Black to tie patio and fire pit together.

The designed Trex deck with cable rails installed by Bruce Grifforst with Adaptable Homes is Completed as well. New Deck Pics Coming Soon.

I can transform your landscape from ordinary to extraordinary by designing and installing your new Intimate Gardens & Outdoor Living Space.

If you live outside of West Michigan, I would still be happy to consult on your project and design your outdoor living space.

Contact Brent now to learn more. (616) 328-3258

Creating Harmony in the Landscape: Color Schemes

In the landscape, harmony refers to the way in which various elements in the landscape are organized to create a sense of unity or continuity within an individual garden area as well as between distinct areas within the overall landscape. Various elemental types can be used to create harmony within a landscape. Each element adds a new dimension of unity within the garden and landscape. Among these various elements, I would like to emphasis the following: Color Schemes, Hardscape elements, Repeated Forms, and Green Spaces.

Let’s first consider color schemes.  Color Schemes are probably the most easily identified element in a landscape, and therefore the most habitually emphasized. Color schemes rely on specific color combinations that can make or break a garden. They can create harmony or consonance within the landscape.  Therefore, color schemes must be chosen with care to ensure you accomplish your express purpose. 

The most exciting combinations are not always planned.  As you create your gardens, you will unexpectedly come across combinations that excite your senses.  Feel free to experiment with new partnerships. Choose an individual color, several analogous or complimentary colors to be used throughout the landscape. 

Color partnerships can be separated into two categories: contrasting/complimentary colors and analogous/harmonizing colors. When contrasting colors are combined, they tend to draw attention to themselves through explosive relationship. Tension is created, heightening our senses and drawing our eyes to them. By standing out, these vibrant color combinations further emphasis the more harmonic color combinations. Seizing our attention, these contrasting color combinations can highlight transition between two areas in the landscape. Beware: too many dissonant color combinations can destroy a garden. Our goal should then be to limit these contrasting color combinations in order to emphasis the overall unity of the garden or landscape. I often combine purples with complementary yellows in smaller numbers or greens with bright reds as seen in the Poppy or carnation.

Complimentary colors, on the other hand, are soothing.  They create a sense of serenity. Try using blues and purples or reds and orange.  When transitioning between color combinations, use neutral colors such as whites, silvers, greys and blacks. (Check out this free online interactive color wheel to learn about color wheel theory http://thevirtualinstructor.com/interactivecolorwheel.html).

It is easy to focus exclusively on flower color. However, flowers come and go. They blossom and fade with the seasons’ change. Foliage, however, is longer lasting and often “evergreen” and thus the more significant color producer in the landscape. I would, therefore, encourage you to try basing your color scheme on the foliage of one or more specimen plants. Consider basing your color scheme on the hues of elements such as tree and shrub bark, boulders, garden sculptures and brick or natural stone pavers.

Hardscape elements repeated in the landscape can also draw together a disparate landscape. Thus, when you are dealing with various themes such as formal and informal areas, perennial, annual or mixed, sun and shade gardens, consider using common hardscape elements such as stone or brick. Both of these can be used in a number of applications. For instance, granite can be used to create a very appealing patio or walkway as well as retaining walls, stream beds, accent rocks or sculptures. Perhaps you could use granite to create a unique water feature such as a fountain surrounded by granite pebbles. Then, use the same granite pebbles or a crushed form of granite to create a meandering path through a woodland garden with granite outcroppings.

Repeating a particular plant such as a Rhododendron or weeping Japanese Maple could also add another unifying element.  Often you will find such plants can be grown in both sun and shade with adjustments to irrigation scheduling. 

Try using Redwood or Cedar in both your fencing as well as your decking application.  Match the brick in your front walkway to the brick on your house. It may be difficult to match the house and walkway precisely, especially if your home is more than a couple of years old. However, there is almost always another brick that will coordinate with the existing house brick.

Foliage: Form, Color and Texture

When shopping for new garden plants, it is easy to hyper-focus on flowers.  Big box stores create dramatic displays of heavily flowering perennials grouped together on shelves, right where they will catch your attention.  The beauty of those massed flowers really draws the eye and entices the senses.  What could be more beautiful in your yard than to mimic that stunning display.  Oceans of purple flowering Salvia or Veronica bringing color to your drab gardens.  Splashes of orange and red Poppy.  Swaths of yellow Daylillies and Black-eyed Susan bursting with color.

The plants you see flowering on the shelves now, most likely will not be flowering two weeks from now. You are seeing plants at their flowering peak.  For retail garden centers, timing is everything. The stores and nurseries work together to ensure stocked plants are in their seasonal prime.  So, plants that flower in early spring, will be sold in late winter and early Spring, when they are showing off their colors to the best of their ability.  Summer flowering plants are stocked in late Spring or early Summer.  Fall flowering plants are displayed in late Summer or early Fall.

Stores are not attempting to rip you off.  But don't be fooled by wishful thinking.  These plants will not flower forever.  Most plants bloom for three to six weeks.  Then you are left with leaves and stems. 

So, when purchasing your plants, consider the form, color and texture of a plant's foliage.  Between periods of flowering, foliage holds a garden together.  Consider using plants for the sake of their foliage and count the flowers as a bonus.

The challenge: planning your garden to ensure interest throughout the growing season.  You can plant swaths of perennials, grasses and shrubs to create dramatic displays of your own.  But keep in mind the limited flowering period of each plant.  Plan for flowering lulls.

Ornamental Grass and Grass-like plants:
The variety of available grass and grass-like plants on the market today is astounding.   There are ornamental grasses ranging in size from six inches to ten feet tall.  Some clump, some spread, some weep, some stand upright.  Grasses can be found in red, white, blue, silver, purple, black, variegated, striped, spotted and solid, broad of leaf or narrow. These plants flower in Spring, Summer, and Fall in plumes of red, pink, white, silver, brown, purple....  My point is this: grass offers a wide range of options that can bring interest in form, texture, and color. 
Consider some of the ornamental grasses and grass-like plants below to bring beauty to your gardens.

Calamagrostis brachytricha  - Korean Feather Reed Grass

Korean Feather Reed Grass matures at approximately 24" tall and 30" wide.  This plant tends to be fairly loose in habit, especially when young.  This grass does well in partial shade.  I would use Korean Feather Reed Grass in the foreground of large flowering perennials such as Black-eyed Susan and Cone flower.  The foliage color contrast with these particular perennials



 

 Blue Spire Oat Grass

Festuca glauca'Elijah Blue' - Elijah Blue Fescue 

This Fecue is a well controlled mounding/weeping grass that tends to be a deep steel blue and grows approximately 1' tall and 9" wide. 

 

 Stipa (Nasella) tenuissima - Ponytail Grass

 

Calamagrostis acutiflora 'Overdam' - Overdam Feather Reed Grass

 

Ornamental Grasses can be left standing through Fall and Winter to add form, texture and color to what could otherwise be a bleak or drab garden.

Astilbe

Coral Bell

For more tips and tricks to creating a lush and beautiful garden, continue reading my blog.

For help designing, installing or maintaining your landscape, feel free to give Brent Langley a call at (616) 328-3258.  Thank you



Kensington Palace Gardens - July 2013

My wife, Melissa, and I had the opportunity to make it to London, England, in July, 2013, staying at the Thistle Kensington located just across Bayswater Road from Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park.  We spent many hours walking the 650 acres of the Park and Garden where the Kings and Queens and their Courts have walked and gather since its aquisition in 1536 by King Henry VIII. 

I was surprised to find the majority of Kensington Garden and Hyde Park consists, not of "gardens" as we would understand the term in the United States, but of open lawns and ancient trees through which ran broad boulevards for strolling, running and biking. These areas are more like NY's Central Park or St. Louis' Forest Park.  The seeming monotony is broken by occasional fountains and formal displays of flowering annuals, perennials, shrubs and trees.  When we discovered these, I was ecstatic. 

The formal garden of Kensington Palace, known as the Dutch Sunken Garden, is lush and vibrant in July, boasting extravagant displays of a wide variety of flowering perennials as well as palms and evergreen shrubs and trees.

Kensington Palace Sunken Garden



Kensington Palace Formal Pool surrounded by cut flagstone walks and topiary in planters close trimmed lawns and vibrant floral and foliar displays. 

Notice the contrast as well as repetition of color throughout the garden.  Color is repeated from bed to bed using a variety of flowering plants, creating continuity while still maintaining interest that draws the eye deeper into the garden to discover the uniqueness of each area.

 

 

The Steel Blue of the Globe Thistle seen here in the foreground is repeated by the Lavender, drawing the eye deeper into the landscape.

 A wide swath of wine-red bipinnatus Cosmos creates a stunning complementing backdrop to the Globe Thistle. 

The striking red flower of 'Bishop of Llandaff' Dahlia stands out dramatically against its black leaves and stems which, in turn, are complemented by the open flower heads of the nearly spent pink Purple Loosestrife(?).

Bee Balm and Ligularia 'The Rocket' in the foreground.

Large topiary Arborvitae leading to the Queen's Alcove and arched walk around the Sunken Garden form the backdrop.