Well, it seems that our “winter” is pretty much over here in Austin and now all thoughts are on spring.  We spent a lot of time getting our backyard in order last year since it is where my studio is, where I occasionally see clients, and where I work all day.  I wanted something pretty to look at and easy to maintain.

Now that we are surely moving into spring, I want to keep adding to the garden so I was stoked when I came across this article in Gardenista that goes step-by-step into how to plan your own garden. It’s very inspiring and since, I’ve hit the sketchbooks on planning my own! Here were the most informative points I gathered from the article:

Keep It Simple: Often thought to be a landscape architects only field, this article truly simplifies the garden planning process. All you need is a paper, a pencil, an eraser, a measuring tape, a colored pencil or two (depending on how fancy you’d like to get) and possibly some inspirational photography.

IMPORTANT POINT: “To draw your plan to scale, you will need to measure distances in the garden: the perimeter, the size of existing garden beds, the size and shape of your trees and shrubs.” – Gardenista

The article offers additional suggestions of scale and an organized way of including plants (both large and small) as well as filling in spaces. This year, I’ll definitely be adding some more ground cover in between the plantings from last year, cold hard succulents and cactus, and maybe a few more vines to fill in our natural wall {all native or drought tolerant of course!}. What’s on your spring gardening list?? Any plant crushes?

See the how-to and read the full helpful article on Gardenista here.

 

photos/images: Gardenista

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