Photo by Chambers Design of Highline in NYC
This is the second post in my series about designing four-season landscapes and winter gardens (you can read the first post here). All of the beauty in the after comes because a few major elements incorporated during the design process. First, a focus has to be put on the cycle of life for the plants to be installed, how they change each season and what plants can be coupled for the best result. Second, (and this is a little more technical), you have to make sure the new design uses the right plants to completely cover the ground so no bare soil is exposed. Third, you really need to make sure that the different plants selected (and how many are used) will create the desired density. Density is what gives the space its sense of fullness. Lastly, time is your friend. The best four-season gardens change over time and offer playful ways to add and subtract plants each year. This post is covering the first point about the dynamic nature of sustainable plant selection.
Plant Dynamite
First, a strong focus has to be put on the cycle of life of different plants to get a successful four-season garden (and thereby get a beautiful winter garden). You don’t want to design only for winter, but instead a planting plan needs to be a flow of color and texture through the year. The flow could even be thought of as a loop without a real beginning and end. This is accomplished by combining perennial flowers and grasses that grow, bloom and go dormant at different times throughout the year.
First, a strong focus has to be put on the cycle of life of different plants to get a successful four-season garden (and thereby get a beautiful winter garden). You don’t want to design only for winter, but instead a planting plan needs to be a flow of color and texture through the year. The flow could even be thought of as a loop without a real beginning and end. This is accomplished by combining perennial flowers and grasses that grow, bloom and go dormant at different times throughout the year.
Many native grasses don’t really start getting tall and full bodied until late summer and then only develop a seed heads as autumn approaches. This means if you just plant grasses in a space, you will have to wait for them to fill it for most of the year. A great exmaple is Panicum virgatum. This grasses is tall and moves with the wind. It has several very awesome varieties like Cape Breeze, Shenandoah, Heavy Metal and Ruby Ribbons. Practically, all of them stretch upward blurring where their tips stop and the sky starts. They display an entire spectrum of green, purple and red blades, creamy seed heads and thick body. But, if you want a bed to be full of texture and color all year long, you can’t get it by planting a bunch of Panicum. It has to be coupled with other plants like tulips that will spring out of the ground in April, bloom in early May and will have all but disappeared by June (stem and all). It's in June that grasses really wake up, so you need other early summer plants to add structure until the grasses are really anchor the space.
Photo by Chambers Design of Storm King Art Center
Photo by Chambers Design of Storm King Art Center
The two images above are photos of Storm King Art Center in New York State from early May 2016. You can see the native grasses starting to grow where it has been mowed. There's already a nice texture to the landscape, but the grass is still fairly short. Sense it's early May, the grasses are between 18 to 20 inches tall.
As a reference point, I included the two images below showing an almost-2-year-old and an almost-5-year-old standing in the grass. The almost-2-year-old is around 2 ft tall while the almost-5-year-old is just under 4ft tall (he's a big boy).
 The Almost-2-Year-Old |  The Almost-5-Year-Old |
Out of the Box
Planting an area that incorporates, or even welcomes, how plants change their character by looking different from season to season runs totally contrary to most landscape designs. Typically, you have one or two plants (usually a shrubs or evergreens) that is used in a pattern or line and then basically looks the same the entire year. When you start to break from that way of designing landscapes, the actual planting plan becomes more important as well as a knowledge for a wide variety of plants and how/when they change from month to month.
The planting plan is so critical because you need multiple plants growing and blooming within the same space in an orchestrated way. Most budgets can't support installing potted size plants, so you need to purchase bulbs, seeds, plugs as well as potted size plants to get the desired effect. You want to buy them from organic nurseries and vendors so that they are healthy as well. Most landscaping projects settle for plants that are one-size-fits-all and can be picked up on sale at Home Depot.
Planting an area that incorporates, or even welcomes, how plants change their character by looking different from season to season runs totally contrary to most landscape designs. Typically, you have one or two plants (usually a shrubs or evergreens) that is used in a pattern or line and then basically looks the same the entire year. When you start to break from that way of designing landscapes, the actual planting plan becomes more important as well as a knowledge for a wide variety of plants and how/when they change from month to month.
The planting plan is so critical because you need multiple plants growing and blooming within the same space in an orchestrated way. Most budgets can't support installing potted size plants, so you need to purchase bulbs, seeds, plugs as well as potted size plants to get the desired effect. You want to buy them from organic nurseries and vendors so that they are healthy as well. Most landscaping projects settle for plants that are one-size-fits-all and can be picked up on sale at Home Depot.
Planting Plan by Chambers Design with perennials and grasses for home in Montclair, NJ
Seasonal Chart by Chambers Design that accompanies the planting plan shown above. Each plant's life cycle is displayed for seasonal changes.
Above is an example of a planting plan I created for a home in Monclair, NJ. The client wanted to create a sustianable landscape throught the front yard. The plan shows how several plants are placed near each other. There is hatching on the plan as well to show were groundcover will go and options for seed for several perennials.
Seasonal Chart Diagram
The Seasonal Chart Diagram is a tool that helps to visualize how each plant will change throuhgout the year as well as if it will have winter interest. I use them for every project even if the focus isn't entirely on a four-season design. It can really make decisions about plant combinations easier when you "see" different life cycle of each plant with all the others. The "GREEN" shows when foliage is interesting but has not yet bloomed. The "PURPLE" shows when the plant will be in bloom or at its peak color and fullness. The "SALMON" shows when the plants are interesting after the bloom has gone or when it seed heads.
Plants to Plant
Bulbs are for the early spring and need to be placed in an area to get plenty of sunlight as soon as days start to warm up. This is fairly easy because the trees don't have leaves yet. Even in areas that will be heavily shaded by summer, they can still have tulips in early spring. You can literally plant things like crocus, tulips and irises adjacent to each other for an early spring display and still have space for grasses and perennials for summer color and your winter garden delight.
Seasonal Chart Diagram
The Seasonal Chart Diagram is a tool that helps to visualize how each plant will change throuhgout the year as well as if it will have winter interest. I use them for every project even if the focus isn't entirely on a four-season design. It can really make decisions about plant combinations easier when you "see" different life cycle of each plant with all the others. The "GREEN" shows when foliage is interesting but has not yet bloomed. The "PURPLE" shows when the plant will be in bloom or at its peak color and fullness. The "SALMON" shows when the plants are interesting after the bloom has gone or when it seed heads.
Plants to Plant
Bulbs are for the early spring and need to be placed in an area to get plenty of sunlight as soon as days start to warm up. This is fairly easy because the trees don't have leaves yet. Even in areas that will be heavily shaded by summer, they can still have tulips in early spring. You can literally plant things like crocus, tulips and irises adjacent to each other for an early spring display and still have space for grasses and perennials for summer color and your winter garden delight.
 Photo: Chambers Design of Monarda didyma ‘Jacob Cline’ |  Photo by Chambers Design of Liatris spicata 'Kobold' |  Photo: Coreopsis by Chambers Design |
Other flowering plants will need to accompany the bulbs. Some of my favorites are Liatris spicata (or it’s shorter variety ‘Kobold’) and Monarda didyma ‘Jacob Cline’ (and it’s cousin, M. punctate). The entire Coreopsis genus is also a wonderful list of plants to use. I love the C. x ‘Mercury Rising’. Each of these plants is selected for different reasons. For example, L. spicata gives a space structure and texture with its incredible pointy foliage that starts growing just as the tulips start to die away. However, the foliage is completely overshadowed by its enchanting deep electric lavender flowers that come in mid to late summer.
Photo by Chambers Design: Jacob Cline blooming in rain garden
Jacob Cline will quickly fill a space in May and June. It can get four feet tall (I’ve actually seen it six feet tall in ideal conditions), but by early July the tallest stems will likely need to be trimmed. If coordinated well, you will trim your Jacob Cline right as any Panicum virgatum starts to take center stage.
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Even when you trim the JC back, it will keep blooming. Instead of tall stalks, it will flower more like groundcover as shown in the images above.
With so much activity going on in one space, you need an eye for detail to layout the plants so they are compatible and not competitive, to determine the number of plants you need, where to source them and (most important!!!) how to arrange them to expresses a sense of art, nature and beauty for spring, summer and after.
If you want to create a more ecologically, beautiful landscape with native plants and winter interest, feel free to contact us about your project.
Want More Winter Interest, check out these links:
Beauty in the After, the Series
Winter Gardening: Beauty in the After
With so much activity going on in one space, you need an eye for detail to layout the plants so they are compatible and not competitive, to determine the number of plants you need, where to source them and (most important!!!) how to arrange them to expresses a sense of art, nature and beauty for spring, summer and after.
If you want to create a more ecologically, beautiful landscape with native plants and winter interest, feel free to contact us about your project.
Want More Winter Interest, check out these links:
Beauty in the After, the Series
Winter Gardening: Beauty in the After
Check out the NEW Lawn Shop for sustainable products and plants:
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