Contemporary Garden with Native Plants

The Challenge

The owners had built a new home and wanted a landscape that would suit their busy lifestyle, look good, offer habitat for wildlife, provide shade for a western patio. The owners had particular plants in mind to use and needed help to plan how they would best fit into the garden. Years later a pond and raised beds were needed in the rear garden.

The Design

The anchors for the garden were an existing Japanese Maple, a new mature Pinus contorta “Contorta”, a Taxus (yew) hedge to break the plane of the front elevation of the home, and Arctostaphylos uva ursi (kinikinnick) as an alternative to a lawn. We also added Cornus ‘kousa’ and Calamagrostis “Karl Foerster.”  Years later we added a water garden and planters in the rear yard in keeping with the rectangular theme of the existing beds and planting. The owners chose to furnish the pond and beds at a later date.

Before

After