How to Landscape a Garden and Lawn with Curves

Adding curves to your garden is more complex than just shaping the garden bed. When you plan the landscape of your garden or lawn, think above ground level. Visualize the wave you create using plant heights, color and size at the beginning, peak and end of each season. Plan your landscape with these curves in mind. Copy Mother Nature, and she will appreciate the compliment. Does this Spark an idea?

Instructions

1

Plan the shape of your garden bed by laying out a hose, sculpted to the shape you want. Create a circular garden to highlight a feature, patio or tree. Serpentine lines can separate a garden bed from the lawn or encompass a patio. Add rounded corners to soften an entrance area. These patterns add ground level curves to your garden and lawn.

2

Choose plants of varied heights for three-dimensional appeal. If you have not chosen your plants, create a visual aid. Find pictures with names of the flowers and bushes you like. Research how well they grow in your environment to make sure the plant can reaches its full size. Tape the picture to a stick at its mature height and place it in the garden, leaving plenty of room around each to show maturity size.

3

Look at the top line of your stick garden, checking for a pleasing wave created by the top heights of your sticks. Rearrange your plan as necessary. If you have a unique feature you want accented in the yard, plan for taller plants to draw the eye upward or lower plants to draw the eye down to highlight this feature. Tall bushes and plants can make an emphatic endpoint for gardens and lawns, a way of defining your space.

4

Create an appealing mid-level curve with varied shapes and foliage that looks different before, during and after the plant blooms.

5

Plan for at least half of each planting of similar height to have a similar flowering time. Add a large letter to your stick garden that indicates the month it blooms -- such as A for Aug, J for July, j for June -- to visualize how it will look.

6

Add garden lighting to accentuate the curves at night. Plan the lighting just like you did your garden, with varied shapes, heights and textures to bring your garden and lawn alive at night. Buy a large enough 12-volt converter box to handle multiple outputs and multiple units of lighting. Set up soft spot lighting and down lights for walkways.

7

Place garden art to scale. Install large and dramatic structures with large and dramatic plants. Put peek-a-boo pieces with ground cover or small plants. Don't overwhelm your plants with art. Let nature give its natural curve to your landscape.