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LANDSCAPE DESIGN MAKEOVER IN SHARON

When a Sharon homeowner wanted to meet about redesigning her front yard gardens, Garden-911’s Carol Lundeen suggested expanding the vision to include improved circulation from the driveway to the front door, adding ease of use and curb appeal at the same time.

View from the front door of a Garden-911 Boston landscape design.

View from the front door of a redesigned front entry in Sharon, MA. What was a once a bare concrete landing and stairs is now adorned under a portico, with slabs of elegant granite on the landing and treads. At ground level, where you see a path of white river stones was once an asphalt walk from the driveway to the base of the stairs. The planted area was once lawn, and there was no brick path lined with cobblestones.
All these design changes improved the circulation around the home, as well as the curb appeal.
Plantings include a MA native redbud tree, Cercis canadensis, and a ground cover of variegated solomans seal.
For more informatoin about giving the front of your home a face lift, visit https://www.garden-911.com/

 

 

 

 

 

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LANDSCAPE DESIGN TIP: Use foliage for contrast

Plant foliage employed as a contrast element in landscape designHere’s an example of using contrast as a visual principle of landscape design. In the foreground of this scene in Cambridge, MA, leaves of a variegated dogwood tree contrast along a diagonal with the pink flowers of a blooming azalea shrub in the middle ground, while in the background the curly-edged rumpled leaves of perennial geraniums anchor as a groundcover.

In addition to contrast, other principles of landscape design include unity and harmony, balance, hierarchy, scale and proportion, dominance and emphasis, and similarity and contrast. Design elements such as color, line, shape and volume, texture and pattern, space the illusion of space, motion and the illusion of motion and value can be combined as ingredients in a recipe that creates the various design principles that make a design a visual success.Other elements of a successful landscape design are functional, such as circulation around a home and its grounds, and water management.

Garden-911 Boston offers landscape design services. Visit https://www.garden-911.com/ or call 617-327-9254 for more information.

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THE JOY OF A TULIP TREE IN YOUR LANDSCAPE

Liriodendron tulipifera flower, a tulip-shaped flower on the large native tulip tree.

LOOKING FOR A LARGE, STRAIGHT-TRUNKED FLOWERING NATIVE TREE FOR YOUR LANDSCAPE? Consider a tulip tree for your design, Liriodendron tulipifera. It grows up to 200 feet in height, and features yellow and orange tulip-shaped flowers and leaves. I came across this one at Stodderd’s Neck State Park in Hingham, MA, an off-leash dog park overlooking Weymouth Back River.

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GARDEN DESIGN FOR LATE SPRING BLOOMS

THE POWER OF DIAGONAL DESIGN WITH STRONG FOREGROUND, MIDDLEGROUND AND BACKGROUND

Dappled afternoon sun glints off a latticed front entry, backed by a story-high rhododendron that anchors the middleground of this front yard garden design in Sharon, MA. In the foreground a pavered path from the driveway to the front door is lined with two masses of bearded iris that multiply the color effect of the rhododendron’s purple-pink blooms. Pink peonies provide visual pop that make this diagonal perspective so powerful in the design. Pink dianthus in the lower left mirror the peonies’ color impact. In the distance, mature deciduous trees near the property line form the background layer of the composition. Photo copyright 2018 Carol Lundeen. All rights reserved.

 

 

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HOW TO STAKE GARDEN PEONIES, OTHER TALL PERENNIALS

Here’s the short answer to how to stake peonies, Rudbeckia laciniata ‘Herbstonne,’ baptisia, asters and other tall and/or vase-shaped perennials that are at risk of collapsing under their own weight this season. Do these in the spring:

EIGHT STEPS TO STAKE GARDEN PEONIES

  1. Get stakes, twine and pruners.
  2. Set five stakes evenly around peony.
  3. Tie twine to one stake.
  4. Loop twine around each consecutive stake.
  5. Return to and loop around first stake.
  6. Loop twine around every other stake.
  7. Return to first stake
  8. Cut and tie off twine.

For more answers, here’s an expanded explanation:

  1. Gather five garden stakes for each perennial, plus twine and sharp scissors or pruners to cut the twine. Safety glasses or goggles are a great idea too, as getting your eye poked by a stake takes all the fun out of staking.
  2. Push your five stakes into the ground, evenly spaced around the drip line of your perennial. If you view your perennial from above, the drip line is the circle or perimeter of the foliage from which water drips to the ground.
  3. This third step completely encloses all your perennial stems. Starting with a stake that is towards the back of the perennial, tie a slip knot around the stake about 15 inches above the ground. Next, one stake at a time, consecutively, draw your twine around your circle of stakes, making a complete loop (not a knot) around each stake as you go. When you get back to your starting stake, make a complete loop around it, too.
  4. This fourth step creates a supporting matrix of spaces through which your stems will grow. Resuming at what was once your first and is now your last stake, draw your twine around every other stake, making a complete loop around each of these stakes as you go. You may need to carefully pass the twine between stems to reach your next stake. When you get back to your original stake, cut your twine long enough to tie a slip knot, and tie the knot. If you’ve done this correctly and you could look at it from above, your twine pattern will look like a star inside a circle.
  5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 at least one more time, higher up on the stakes to support future growth. You may be tempted to cut the stakes to a lower height, but you’ll risk not having enough support for the flower stems once they elongate and your flowers are in full bloom, especially after they become heavy with rain.
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SHARON GARDEN CLUB PLANT SALE 5/29 – NEW LOCATION

Join me at the Sharon Garden Club’s Annual Plant Sale this Saturday, May 19th from 9-noon, at our new location at the First Congregational Church. Simultaneously there are three yard sales and the library book sale all adjacent to one another. The Club has a seedlings initiative this year, and I’ll be bringing jumbo Primrose Lady marigolds as well as tomatoes grown from organic seeds. Shop early for best selection!

Flyer for the Sharon Garden Club annual plant sale on Saturday, May 19, 2018

Sharon Garden Club Annual Plant Sale Saturday, May 19 at the First Congregational Church on Main Street, 9-noon

 

 

 

 

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GROW NATIVE MA HOSTS INTERNATIONAL AWARD WINNING LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT MATTHEW CUNNINGHAM

Landscape architect Matthew Cunningham presented at Evenings with Experts, co-sponsored by Grow Native Massachusetts and the Boston Society of Landscape Architects.

International award winning landscape architect Matthew Cunningham presented at Evenings with Experts, on April 4th. Co-sponsored by Grow Native Massachusetts and the Boston Society of Landscape Architects, his design bring a sense of nature to his clients’ homes, creating a sense of privacy and wildness through the use of hard-working, beautiful native plants.

Last night, international award winning landscape architect Matthew Cunningham presented Revealing a Sense of Place at Grow Native Massachusetts’ Evenings with Experts talk at the Cambridge Public Library. The humble, approachable Matthew presented before-and-after profiles of several design projects he’s taken on, from a rocky, tide-swept cove in Maine to suburban West Newton and Brookline. In all cases, he borrowed concepts from nature, incorporating native plant communities into his designs, creating a sense of privacy and wildness for his clients.

The most thrilling part for me was his satellite photo of Cambridge, MA pointing out his first client there. The next slide showed that the neighbors have caught on, and now his clients are dotted all over town, creating a growing quilt of properties that support wildlife and pollinators, manage and filter rain water, and provide numerous other ecosystem services that only native plants can provide…including services for clients who disdain tree huggers and care primarily for aesthetics.

Keeping up with the Joneses now means people are investing in native plants, and it turns out that native plants don’t make a mess in your yard. They actually create a robust landscape system that hums on its own. This is the kind of news that inspires and delights me, and we could all use good news these days.

 

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TOP 100 NATIVE PLANTS FOR NEW ENGLAND GARDENS

Cover of Native Plants for New England Gardens

Congratulations to Mark Richardson and Dan Jaffe on publishing their extensive observations and close up photographs of their top 100 New England native plants. I’ve studied with them dozens of times while earning a certificate in native plant horticulture and design at the New England Wildflower Society’s Garden in the Woods in Framingham, MA and I think of them as native plant rock stars.

Mark is Botanic Garden Director, and Dan propagator and stock bed grower at Garden in the Woods.

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LESSONS LEARNED WHEN FIELD BOTANY MEETS DESIGN – MARCH 7

Uli Lorimer, Curator of the Native Flora Garden at Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Uli Lorimer, Curator of the Native Flora Garden at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, will present Lessons Learned When Field Botany Meets Design at Grow Native Massachusetts’ Evenings with Experts lecture series at the Cambridge Public Library, Wednesday March 7 from 7:00 – 8:30 pm.

Evenings with Experts | Uli Lorimer | March 7 | Grow Native Massachusetts | Cambridge Public Library

Uli Lorimer, Curator of the Native Flora Garden at Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Ecologically attuned designers are increasingly looking to nature for inspiration in the design of managed landscapes. But connecting field botany to horticulture is complex, and insights gained from observations in the wild don’t always translate directly into a cultivated garden.

Uli will use the recently expanded native flora garden at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, a cultivated pine barrens and coastal plain grassland, as a case study— sharing lessons learned along the way as the project evolved from a concept into a dynamic, living landscape. Good design allows for change and succession to occur, and flexibility in design intent is a valuable strategy because things do not always work out as planned.

Uli Lorimer has been the Curator of Native Flora at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Garden for over a decade. He was instrumental in the expansion of the Garden’s native plant collection, using only material sourced from the wild and grown from seed. As Field Chair at BBG, he coordinates fieldwork with regional botanists and leads botanical expeditions for naturalists and horticulturists.
This lecture is co-sponsored by Mount Auburn Cemetery

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THE BEAUTIFUL ADAPTATIONS OF NATIVE PLANTS EVENT FEB 7th

Eager to learn more about native plants? Join Grow Native Massachusetts‘ Evenings with Experts this winter! 

This free public lecture series is held at the Cambridge Public Library on the first Wednesday of each month, from February through May from 7:00 — 8:30 pm.

On February 7, Dan Segal, owner of The Plantsmen Nursery, will present The Beautiful Adaptations of Native Plants: Inviting the Wild into our Gardens.

Native plants have evolved a broad array of adaptations in the wild, yielding not only the ornamental features embraced in horticulture but many fascinating mechanisms for survival. Dan will take us beyond ‘pretty’ plant features to explore the origins of these adaptive traits, and the critical importance of regional variation. This insight helps us to select plants that are genuinely suited to our landscapes.  He will also compare and contrast large-scale nursery production that favors the cloning of cultivars, with small-scale nursery propagation that favors seed-grown straight species.  To know and source native plants effectively, understanding their propagation can be just as important as species selection.

As the owner of The Plantsmen Nursery, Dan Segal specializes in native plants, local seed collection, and natural landscaping. Dan has collected and propagated over 1,000 species of native plants in his three decades of work as a nurseryman, giving him great insight into the fascinating variety of adaptations that plants have evolved to survive. His nursery is in Ithaca, NY, where founded the Ithaca Native Plant Symposium in 2009.

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