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Designing a Sunny border
by C. Colston Burrell
A successful sunny Border design that emulates nature begins with dreams, is guided by a clear vision, and is recorded in a plan. At the start, indulge yourself in the luxury of dreaming. Then turn your garden dream into a reality guided by a design. Great gardens can be made without a plan, but for most people, it is an important starting point. A plan helps you visualize what is in your mind's eye.
Locating the Garden
Begin with the selection of a site. Where you place the sunny Border determines what you can grow. Choose a location suited to the overall layout of your yard. Think in practical as well as aesthetic terms. Where is the water spigot? Where do the kids play? Place your garden out of harm's way. Consider views from the house, the border's relationship to the terrace or deck, and its proximity to other landscape features. The garden will look its best if the components are integrated into a unified whole. One large bed often looks nicer and is easier to maintain than several smaller ones.
Turn the garden of your dreams into a reality. To create a design that suits the site, take your time to determine the style and layout of your flower bed.
Carefully assess the size and style of your flower bed. Let existing features, such as the shape of the lawn or the terrace around which you plan to install the bed, guide your design. If you have never delineated an outdoor space or given a pleasing shape to your lawn, start there, and then add the flower bed or borders to complement the space. Don't skimp on the size of your border: You need ample space to accommodate a variety of plants for a long season of blooms. Make room for 30 to 40 plants at a minimum. And remember, the farther the garden is from your viewing point, the larger it must be to make an impact.
Consider access to the garden as you develop your plan. You need to be able to reach all areas of the garden from the edges or from internal paths. A person of average height can reach about 2 ½ feet into a bed. A Border that's accessible from one side should be no more than three to four feet deep; if it's wider, it needs a rear or central path. A bed that's accessible from all sides can be up to five or six feet deep without a path. If you'd like to arrange flowers in front of a backdrop of shrubs, create a bed that's at least six to eight feet deep. If you have room, 12 feet is ideal.
Creating a Base Map
The easiest way to design your garden is by drawing up a plan. You will need a few tools to get started: a ruler, graph paper, a pencil, and a tape measure. The first step is to decide on the scale for your drawing. A common scale is one square on the graph paper to two square feet of garden space. If you are planning a large garden, one square per three feet may work better. Tape a large sheet of graph paper to a table. Record on the paper the corners of the house, property lines, and other existing features that will act as reference points. Then spread a piece of tracing paper over your base map. Sketch the shape and size of your future garden area on the tracing paper. Now you are ready to begin designing.
Combining the Plants
Choosing plants is my favorite part of designing a garden. Start by reading the plant descriptions in the "Encyclopedia of Sun-Loving Perennials" in The Sunny border, keeping in mind soil and moisture conditions. Make a list or chart of the plants that appeal to you, jotting down flower color, bloom time, height, and spread of every plant. Once completed, your list will be useful throughout the design process.
Combine plants to highlight their individual attributes, pairing rounded forms with spiky ones, and setting airy shapes against bold ones.
First, choose a few outstanding anchor plants that bloom in different seasons. These plants will become the centerpieces for a series of plant combinations. Next pick complementary plants that bloom at the same time as the anchor plants. Consider flower color and size, the form of the plant, and the texture of the leaves.
Draw the plants or cut pictures from magazines and make a collage. Place rounded forms next to spiky ones and use sprawling plants, such as verbena and winecups (Callirhoe) to weave together larger clumps and unify the front edge of the bed. Don't place too many similar shapes together. Place the tallest plants in the middle or back unless they are airy enough to be transparent, like meadow rues (Thalictrum).
The secret to successful design lies in choosing and combining plants to maximize their individual attributes. If you know the characteristics of the plants, you can layer them to get the most bloom in the smallest space. You can arrange plants so that combinations of spring bloomers are topped in summer and again in fall by new combinations of flowers. Use one plant to show off another or to fill a space left when one goes dormant. Contrast billowing, airy plants with bolder textures. To maximize the visual appeal of your garden, concentrate the flowers that bloom at the same time. Keep linking pleasing, varied plant combinations until you have filled your garden space. Be sure to repeat one plant, key color, or strong form throughout the garden to maintain unity and create rhythm. A unified design is essential to make the garden look and feel right.
Shrubs are natural additions to flower gardens. From earliest spring through the hard frosts of fall, shrubs enhance the landscape with a kaleidoscope of flowers, foliage, and fruits. In winter, bare twigs or evergreen foliage add texture to a barren or snowy landscape. In early spring the branches provide a framework for the garden and a background for early flowers and bulbs. In autumn, foliage and fruit steal the show from fading asters and other flowers.
Laying Out the Bed
To maximize the visual appeal of your garden, group together flowering plants that bloom at the same time. Above is Mediterranean spurge (Euphorbia characias).
Once you are happy with your plan and have the plants lined up, prepare the planting bed by amending the soil and raking the surface smooth. Using a tape measure, wooden stakes, and string, mark off one-, two-, or three-foot grid intervals, depending on the size of the garden and the intricacy of the design. Measure out squares and spray the outline of the grid on the soil with bio-safe florist's paint, or trace the grid in the soil with a rake handle or other tool. Lay out the entire grid first. Now you are ready to set out the plants according to the plan, referring to the grid to get the spacing right. If you measure the length of your trowel, you can use it as a handy tool for fine-tuning. I prefer to lay out the entire garden before I plant. I usually need to make adjustments, and I might change my mind when I see actual plant combinations in place.
I view a garden as a work in progress. Whether it is two months, two years, or two decades old, there is inevitably room for improvement as the design matures. The best design tool you have is your shovel. The wonderful thing about plants is that you can move them. Planting and tending a garden is a creative process. Your efforts will be paid back tenfold as you eagerly await the opening of the first daffodil, breathe the intoxicating fragrance of a mock orange, and revel in the beauty of a summer Border ablaze with glowing colors.
C. Colston Burrell is a designer, writer, photographer and naturalist. A lifelong gardener and advocate for native plants, he has written and taught about design and plants for over 20 years. He has edited several Brooklyn Botanic Garden handbooks, including Ferns: Wild Things Make a Comeback in the Garden (1994, 1995), The Natural Water Garden: Pools, Ponds, Marshes & Bogs for Backyards Everywhere (1997), Woodland Gardens: Shade Gets Chic (1995), and The Shady border: Knockout Plants That Light up the Shadows (1998). He is the author of Perennial Combinations: Stunning Combinations That Make Your Garden Look Fantastic Right From the Start (Rodale Press, 1999) and the award-winning A Gardener's Encyclopedia of Wildflowers: An Organic Guide to Choosing and Growing Over 150 Beautiful Wildflowers (Rodale Press, 1997). He has graduate degrees in horticulture and landscape architecture. Cole recently moved his garden from Minneapolis to the Blue Ridge Mountains near Charlottesville, Virginia.
Photos: Derek Fell, David Cavagnaro, Beth Chatto