The secret to building attractive, stylish Colorado landscape designs is reaching a good stability between the traditional simplicity of nature and the latest architectural beauty of your home. This excellent unity between garden and home offers relaxing living both outside and inside of your property.
The most important part in preparing any functional and elegant garden style, regardless of how elaborate or how easy it is, is careful consideration to the design of the house, as well as the size of the entire residence. With these details, you can choose on an overall landscape style theme and start to use other necessary elements and principles of garden style into your plan.
The principles of landscape designs includes interconnecting the elements of unity, scale, balance, simplicity, variety, emphasis, and sequence as they apply to line, form, texture, and color.
Unity is the Quality of Oneness.
Unity attracts and holds attention. It organizes view into orderly groups with emphasis.
Lines Connects and Defines the Space, Creating Outdoor Rooms.
The element of line refers to the fact that the viewer’s eye movement or flow can be governed by the arrangement of plants and their borders. Lines are a powerful design element that define rooms and connect people to the landscape.
Form Includes the Three-Dimensional Mass.
The placement of landscape plants in a thoughtful manner regarding their form is one method for promoting a unified feel. The element of form is defined as the shape of a plant and the structure of its branching pattern. Form is determined by the line, direction, and arrangement of branches and twigs.
Horizontal and spreading forms emphasis the lateral extent and breadth of space. They are comfortable because it corresponds with the natural direction of eye movement.
Rounded forms are most common in plant materials. They allow for easy eye movement and create a pleasant undulation that leads itself to plant groupings.
Vase-shaped trees define a comfortable “people space” beneath the canopy.
Weeping forms lead the eye back to the ground. What is below the weeping form often becomes a focal point.
Pyramidal forms direct the eyes upward, so use sparingly. Grouping pyramidals will soften the upward influence. They will look more natural in the surroundings with foliage to the ground.
Texture is Fine/Coarse, Heavy/Light, Thin /Dense, and Light/Shade.
The element of texture, is subtle enough that it can be employed to inject variety into a garden design without destroying unity. Texture can be defined as the relationship between the foliage and twig size, and the mass of the plants. At a distance, texture comes from the entire mass effect of plants and the qualities of light and shadows.
Color Gives Greatest Appeal, and Evokes the Greatest Response.
Color is powerful in creating mood and feeling. “Color therapy” is a popular topic in our rapid paced modern world. What moods and feeling do various color create for you? What colors work for the landscape story line? What moods and feeling do you want in the garden? Is it a room for relaxation and healing or a room for action activities?
Scale Evokes Emotional Connection.
Proportion is the sense that the size of the individual components (the landscape plants) or groups of components in a landscape is consistent with the landscape as a whole. In other words, the idea behind proportion is very similar to that behind the basic element, scale.
Absolute scale relates the comparative value of landscape elements to a fixed structure (house).
Relative scale relates to comparative relative sizes or “values” of objects in the landscape. Relative scale is very emotionally charged and closely linked to color. It may create a feeling of relaxation and peacefulness or one of energy and action.
Low scale is relaxing and calming. It is used in the home landscape to give a feeling of peace and relaxation.
High scale promotes action. It is used around large buildings and in large spaces to fill the space. Use of high scale in small spaces makes the space feel smaller.
Balance is Equilibrium on Left and Right Sides.
Formal balance repeats the same left and right, giving stability, stateliness, and dignity. It is high maintenance keep both side similar.
Informal balance differs from left to right giving curiosity, movement, and feels alive. Total mass of plants need to balance left and right.
Simplicity and Variety Work Together to Balance.
Simplicity is a degrees of repetition rather than constant change, creating unity. Variety is diversity and contrast in form, texture, and color preventing monotony.
Emphasis is Dominance and Subordination of Elements.
The human mind looks for dominance and subordination in life. As we look at a landscape from any direction, we need to see dominance and subordination of various elements. Emphasis can be achieved through different sizes, bold shapes, groupings, and the unusual or unexpected.
Sequence is the Change or Flow in Form, Color, Texture, and Size Giving Movement or Life.
Change leaf size of adjacent different plants by at least one-half. Use proportionally larger numbers of fine textured plants.
Sequence with Texture
Change leaf size of adjacent different plants by at least one-half. Use proportionally larger numbers of fine textured plants.
Sequence with Color
There are few basic rules on how much warm and cool colors to use. However, watch that the scale does not become too commanding. More is NOT better. As a rule-of-thumb, the designs needs 90% green to set off the 10% color. Darkest shades and the purest intensity dominate and should be used at the focal point. Warm colors work best in sequence. Using cool colors in contrast is more effective than sequences.
Feel like you’re over your head with your Colorado landscape designs? Lawn Pros provides complete custom landscape & gardening services for homes & businesses in Colorado Springs & surrounding areas. From concept to completed project, Lawn Pro’s can handle the design and installation of your new landscape.
Our goal is to provide you with a space to get together with your friends and family and enjoy a better life at the place you call home.
Lawn Pros offers comprehensive, innovative and creative solutions for all your landscape and outdoor living needs. Call (719) 963-6267 today for a free Colorado landscape designs estimate!