The Basic Principles Of Landscape Design

Whether you plan on “borrowing ideas” or plan on creating your own landscaping design, you should have at the very least a basic understanding of the principles of landscape design.

This doesn’t mean that you have to apply apiece principle to apiece part of your plan. But just having an understanding of these principles will help you generate ideas and increase your creativity.

Great landscaping lies in the eyes of the its creator. So, while the principles of landscape design are great guidelines to follow, don’t feel like they’re the “have to rules” of landscaping. Abstract and creativity are allowed.

Unity should be one of your main goals in your design. It might be superior understood and applied as consistency and repetition. Repetition creates unity  by repeating alike elements like plants, plant groups, or decor throughout the landscape. Consistency creates unity in the sense that some or all of the different elements of the landscape fit together to create a whole.

Unity can be reached by the consistency of character of elements in the design. By character, I mean the height, size, texture, color schemes, etc. of different elements.

A good example would be in the use of accent boulders. If you’ve ever seen a landscape design that had one massive white round boulder here and another massive red square granite boulder there and so on, then you’ve seen that unity wasn’t created by this specific element.

This is just one example but the principle applies to all other elements such as groups of plants and materials.

A easy way to create unity in your landscape is by creating themes. And one of the simplest ways to create themes is by using a tiny garden decor or garden statues. Creating a theme garden is easier when it’s related to something you’re interested in or have a passion for.

If you’re into butterflies for instance, you could create a theme using plants that attract butterflies as well as using statues, ornaments, and other decor that are related to butterflies.

Unity should be expressed through at least one element in your landscape and preferably more. Using elements to express a main intent through consistent style and a specific theme is what creates harmony.

Simplicity is actually one of the principles in design and art. It’s one of the ideal guidelines you can follow as a newbie or do it yourselfer. Just keep things easy to start with. You can do more later.

Simplicity in planting, for instance, would be to pick two or three colors and repeat them throughout the garden or landscape. Keeping decor to a minimum and within a specific theme as well as keeping hardscapes such as boulders consistent is also practicing simplicity.

Balance in design is just as the word implies. Equality. There are basically two types of equilibrise in landscape design. Symmetrical and Asymmetrical.

Symmetrical balance is where there are more or less equally spaced matching elements of the garden design. With a garden equally divided, both sides could share the same shape, form, plant height, plant groupings, colors, bed shapes, theme, etc.

You might remember creating something like this when you were a kid in art class at school. Where you take a piece of paper, splash paint on it, fold it in half, unfold it, and then it magically creates an interesting symmetrical design. So symmetrical equilibrise or design is somewhat of a mirror image or reflection.

Asymmetrical equilibrise on the other hand is one of the principles of landscape design that’s a tiny more complex. While textures, forms, colors, etc. might remain constant to create some unity, shapes and hardscapes might be more random. This form of equilibrise often has separate or different themes with apiece having an equal but different type of attraction.

A good example of this would be where bed shapes or paths differ on both sides of the dividing line. One side could be curvy with a sense of flow while the other side is straight, direct, and hard.

This can also create a neat contrast. Flowing lines are amusing to the eye but the bold contrast of a curve with a straight line can be very interesting.

Asymmetrical equilibrise isn’t necessarily limited to just the shape of your garden.

An example might be where one side of the garden is mostly massive shade trees while the other side is predominately a lower growing flower garden or even a mix of both examples. This is only limited to your imagination.

Contrast and harmony can also be reached using plants. Fine foliage verses coarser foliage, round leaves verses spiked leaves as well as color compliments and contrasts.

Plant height, color, and texture might be varied from one area to the next but apiece area should stay consistent within its own theme.

You’ll hear me speak about “themes” a lot. Many successful do it yourself designs follow a basic theme to achieve most of the principles of landscape design described on this page. The proper use of plants and garden decor or a mix of both is a easy way to achieve themes.

Color adds the dimension of real life and interest to the landscape. Bright colors like reds, yellows and oranges seem to advance toward you and can actually make an goal seem closer to you. Cool colors like greens, blues, and pastels seem to move away from you and can make an goal seem farther from you.

Grays, blacks, and whites are considered neutral colors and are ideal used in the background with bright colors in the foreground. However, to increase depth in a landscape, you can use dark and coarse textured plants in the foreground and use fine textured and light colored plants in the background.

Colors can also be used to direct your attention to a specific area of the garden. A bright display among cooler colors would naturally catch the eye.

Natural transition can be applied to refrain immoderate or abrupt changes in your landscape design. Transition is basically gradual change. It can ideal be illustrated in terms of plant height or color but can also be applied to all elements in the landscape including but not limited to textures, foliage shape or size, and the size and shape of different elements.

In other words transition can be reached by the gradual, ascending or descending, arrangement of different elements with varying textures, forms, colors, or sizes.

An example of a good transition would be a stair step effect from massive trees to medium trees to shrubs to bedding plants. This example is where a tiny knowledge of proper plant selection would come in handy.

Transition is one of the principles of landscape design that can be used to “create illusions” in the landscape. For example a transition from taller to shorter plants can give a sense of depth and distance (like in a painting), making the garden seem larger than it really is. A transition from shorter to taller plants could be used to frame a focal point to make it stand out and seem closer than it really is.

Line is of the more structural principles of landscape design. It can mostly be related to the way beds, walkways, and entryways move and flow.

Straight lines are forceful and direct while curvy lines have a more natural, gentle, flowing effect.

Proportion simply refers to the size of elements in relation to apiece other. Of all the principles of landscape design, this one is quite obvious but still requires a tiny thought and planning. Most of the elements in landscape design can be intentionally planned to meet the proper proportions.

For instance if you are creating a small courtyard garden, an enormous seven foot garden statue put in the center would be way out of proportion and a tiny tacky to state the least. Or a small four foot waterfall and pond put in the center of a massive open yard would get lost in the expanse.

Don’t misunderstand this to mean that if you have a massive yard you can’t have smaller features or garden decor. Proportion is relative and elements can be scaled to fit by creating different rooms in the garden. The goal is to create a amusing relationship among the three dimensions of length, breadth, and depth or height.

A small water feature can be proportionate if put in a corner or on the edge of a massive area and becomes a focal point of the larger area while creating its own distinct atmosphere. An entire room, sitting area, or theme can be created around it. Other rooms and themes can be created as well. See small gardens for ideas on creating rooms and creating illusions.

Also, special consideration and study should be given to proper plant selection to refrain using plants that are out of proportion.

Repetition is directly related to unity. Its good to have a variety of elements and forms in the garden but repeating these elements gives variety expression.

Unity is reached by repeating objects or elements that are alike. Too many unrelated objects can make the garden look cluttered and unplanned.

There’s a fine line here. It’s doable that too much of one element can make a garden or landscape feel uninteresting, boring and monotonous.

However, unity can still be created by using several different elements repeatedly. This in turn keeps the garden interesting.

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