Dressing the Yard in Style and Color

Mother Nature is a pretty snazzy dresser. She never clashes, looks loud or obnoxious, appears inappropriate, or seems out-of-season.

So often we try to imitate her, but sometimes our efforts don't quite measure up. Our efforts appear as silly as schoolgirls unskillfully imitating fashion queens and super models. However, there is merit in their efforts, just as our attempts with the landscape have worth.

In time, young women who agonize over fashion magazines learn to adapt what works for them and create their own style. If we study Mother Nature with the same zeal, we too can develop a landscape that reflects both her tastes and ours.

The reason you never find colors that clash in nature is because there is usually enough green foliage to buffer the colors and serve as a backdrop. Our flower gardens have a balance of greenery and color to achieve this same effect.

In the wild, you often find large groups of color together resulting in bright and memorable scenes. A field of poppies, daylilies, or black-eyed-susans always catches our eye. In the back yard you can be more daring and make bolder statements as you attempt to recreate these works of art.

The front yard foundation plants serve to frame the house and should complement architectural detail. Too loud or too many colors in this area can detract from your home.

Staying in one color family works best for the front of the house. Purple, pink and white or yellow, red and orange are two very popular color schemes.

Mother Nature is also fashionably ready every season. She models color even in the depth of winter. With proper planning, our landscapes can produce color all year round as well.

For the winter months, consider a few evergreens for their dark green color. Deciduous trees with winged bark like the Paper-Bark maple, dark trunks like the Tulip tree, or multicolored bark like the River Birch can add interest to the yard even when their leaves have fallen. You can also add color in winter with the red fruit of the Winter King Hawthorn tree or red berries of the Chokeberry shrub or Winterberry hollies.

In the spring, flowering bulbs like daffodils and tulips add color. The flowering trees and shrubs like the crab apple and the forsythia add brighter color along with the soft green growth of newly sprouted buds and leaves of other trees.

In the summer, annuals, perennials and summer flowering bulbs will produce brightly colored flowers of all hues. For fall, consider the foliage of maples, oaks and other trees, as well as the bright orange, yellow and white blossoms of mums or the pink and purple flowers of the asters.

You can learn Mother Nature's color and fashion sense by following a few simple landscape design rules and studying her impeccable style.