As with any garden, having a well-planned flower bed layout is key to its success. Accurate measurements and thoughtful design will ensure that your flowers bloom to their maximum potential in terms of both colors and forms.
Keep your flowers safe by clearly delimiting your flower garden with borders or other materials that prevent grass or other plants from overtaking it, and group flowers with similar water and sun requirements together.
Choosing Your Plants
Flower gardens require creating an aesthetically pleasing palette. Use the color wheel as a guide when selecting colors to coordinate; usually those near each other on the wheel, such as pink and purple, look best together. Foliage should also be considered when adding texture to a garden design and blooms have faded.
Choose plants with year-round appeal. Usually this means selecting spring flowering and summer foliage plants; plus those that bloom throughout autumn to ensure the garden doesn’t become barren in its final days.
Experienced flower garden designers typically incorporate plants that attract pollinators such as hummingbirds and butterflies, not only adding beauty but also drawing pollinators that benefit other aspects of the landscape. It is also important to take note of what type of sunlight each bed receives to determine which varieties or plant types may do well within it; some perennials grow best under full sun while others can tolerate part shade conditions.
Choosing Your Location
Floral gardens make an attractive feature in any home landscape, adding color, texture, and fragrance while drawing butterflies, hummingbirds and other pollinators to your garden.
Before embarking on this endeavor, however, it’s essential to take into account a few key considerations. When selecting the location of your garden flowers it should fall within their USDA growing zone and receive sufficient sunlight.
Consideration of lighting conditions will help you select the optimal plants for your garden. Some species thrive under full sun while others require partial shade.
Once you have chosen a spot for your garden, it is crucial that its boundaries are established. Garden edging is an effective way of doing this as it creates defined spaces which keep grass and other weeds at bay from overtaking your flowers. Rocks or other materials could also add visual interest and define its borders visually.
Creating Your Design
At the core of any successful flower garden lies accurate measurements and an effective layout – whether starting from scratch or revamping an existing space – is proper planning and accurate measurements. Determine the dimensions of your space before drawing a rough sketch to represent it accurately. From there, consider what shape and maintenance patterns would best suit the boundaries (straight or curved), whether any focal points like garden trellises or benches might add character, etc.
Some gardeners choose to arrange flowers by color, height or texture while others combine textures and bloom times for an appealing composition. Gradations in height is key – tall plants should no exceed two-thirds of the width of their bed.
Remember, perennials come in various shapes (also known as forms or habits). Some form cushiony mounds, while others grow upright and spikey. Some gardeners like planting flowers with similar forms together for an eye-catching arrangement; others prefer mixing different ones together for an interesting contrast.
Creating Your Backdrop
Flower gardens make an eye-catching subject for photography. Capturing their beauty from various angles and perspectives adds dimension to compositions while the colorful variety of blooming plants tells an engaging tale as they change season by season.
Consider including features such as paths and borders into your garden design for additional visual interest and to help define focal points. Also take into account the color of the soil and foliage surrounding your blooms for an ideal setting or backdrop for their display.
World-renowned garden designer Piet Oudolf advises paying careful consideration when creating a flower bed design, as different shapes often compliment one another well. Gladiolus spikes and bell-shaped tulip flowers look particularly striking when planted together; adding various foliage textures such as sword-like irises to bleeding heart can add visual interest and bring a refreshing contrast into your garden’s color palette.