The side yard is often an afterthought in the garden-design process — since it's small and hidden from view, it's easy to overlook, but sometimes you could turn it into a lush garden with a lot of detail to plants and landscaping.
Discover 32 innovative Narrow Side Yard Ideas to optimize space and enhance your outdoor living experience effortlessly.
More Ideas for the Narrow Garden Between Suburban Homes - Happy first day of spring! In today's post, I have fresh ideas for that long, awkward space between s
Are you interested in turning your side yard or side patio into a beautiful oasis but aren't sure where to start? In this post, I'll give you simple and actionable ideas that will help you transform your small space into an area you love!
In outdoor landscaping, the side yard often plays a quiet role—a neglected space waiting to be infused with recycled or junk items. However, it holds the potential to become a captivating retreat, an outdoor sanctuary that complements your lifestyle. You can design a narrow pathway adorned with lush greenery, leading from your front yard to a hidden garden nook or make use of space by creating a vertical garden.
Most of us have that dead side yard at our house. You know the one, where nothing grows, you throw the bins and you never walk around there because it’s either too hot or damp?? When you build a new home it’s usually the last thing you think about when…
A rarely used side yard became a great place for ample storage with this 16' x 4' storage shed by Historic Shed. The shed roofed unit fit perfectly under the…
Discover 10 steps to great curb appeal. Spoiler alert: most involve elbow grease! Outside presentation makes a big difference in how a buyer views your home.
Many of us consider our back yards as the place to hang out. However, a front yard outdoor space creates a neighbor friendly, attractive place to meet friends and family. Read on to learn more.
Everything you need to know and do before buying, selling or renting a home. Find tips, research and step-by-step guides to build confidence around your next move.
There are several charming ways to highlight the entrance to your garden using our arbor with gate ideas for inspiration.
Traditional white and brick with cottage-style planting in Newport Beach
Not everyone has the land available to create a grand entrance to their back garden.If you live in a suburban community, it is very likely that there are two na…
Add style and function to your outdoor space with a unique walkway. These backyard pathway ideas work for all kinds of yards, gardens, and patios.
It’s easy to overlook the side yard when landscaping but with a little effort, this neglected space can make a big splash. Pathways, lighting, and....
Check out this step-by-step tutorial with instructional VIDEO! Jen Woodhouse shows you how to lay a paver walkway with grass in between.
Dames Rocket in a vase. I was about to sit down to work on a design themed post on the subject of creating a focal point, when a long ago phone conversation that I had with my Mom flashed into my mind. Newly married, my husband and I had moved up from Nova Scotia and had been living in the greater Toronto area for a couple of years. That weekend I had gone on my first ever garden tour. Goldfish from last summer's pond tour "It turns out that you are a nobody gardener here Mom, unless your garden has a "water feature". Not a pond, mind you, that's way too country quaint! It has to be a "water feature" or it seems as though your garden is not deemed worthy of being seen by the public." Water feature! Those two words do have a kind of grand, cinematic ring to them, don't they? And here I am, all these years later, about to about wax-on about creating a garden "focal point". "Focal point" is another one of those somewhat pretentious terms that has the same flair for the dramatic as "water feature". In my head, I started to imagine readers, who are always polite and encouraging in their comments, privately regarding their computer screens and rolling their eyes, "Blog posts on creating grand entrances, pathways and now one on focal points! Really, Jennifer! I just want to grow some pretty flowers and be done with it!" Could all these years in the big city really have turned me into a garden snob who bandies around designer phrases as if I owned them? Random shot of my front border Gosh, I hope not! Honestly, I think that there is nothing wrong with a straight-forward, honest-to-goodness flower garden. Growing up, my mother's garden was both simple and unpretentious. Her garden had no carefully designed layout. There were no curved beds, no sweeping vistas, no bubbling fountain or koi-filled pond. And if you asked her about her garden's "focal point", I am sure she would have told you, that if her garden had a focal point, it was surely the flowers themselves. My mother certainly knew a lot about growing flowers. In my mother's garden, the beds were straight as arrows. One might think that this lack of artifice was unsophisticated, but actually, this simple design aesthetic was perfectly in keeping with the modern design influences of the late 60's and early 70's. My mother never, ever, bought annuals like petunias or geraniums. Having grown up in the depression years of the 1920's, she regarded annuals as an extravagance; throw-away plants that wouldn't last more than a single summer. There was also an element of snobbery in her opinion of annuals; they were common and therefore too ordinary for her tastes. Her forceful opinions extended to perennials as well. In keeping with her contemporary tastes, she saw no charm in old fashioned cottage garden favourites like bleeding hearts. Random rose shot. This is 'Clair Renaissance' which is an English Style Shrub rose that I admired in the Spargette's garden in Brampton, ON. And my mother absolutely detested roses! And as for hostas, that popular shade garden staple? Well, her garden did not have a single one! To this day, my mother who is still gardening and almost 90, dismisses hosta's as "lazy man's flowers". My mother created her garden back in the 1970's, when we moved into a Pepto Bismol colored house overlooking the Halifax harbour. (These days, you couldn't buy a car for what my parent's paid for that house!) It was the era of harvest gold appliances, spider plants in macrame plant hangers, hot pants, mini skirts and platform soled shoes. So what did my mother grow in her garden? A wide range of perennials, but her favourite flowers were poppies. She had a large collection of annual poppies. She also had big, bright, orangy-red perennial poppies. We had a vegetable garden too. It was a squarish, utilitarian patch of earth totally lacking in artifice. The vegetable garden's practical purpose was to provide the family with inexpensive food in the summer months. There were no herbs, no heirloom tomatoes. My mother grew modern, disease-resistant "Beefstake" tomatoes, strawberries, raspberries, currants and common vegetables like beans and peas. My biggest gardening influence has easily been my mother. I still aspire to have a perennial border that is as beautiful as hers was in early July. I have also gone my own way at the same time. I do have bleeding hearts, roses and hostas in my garden. And I take a far greater interest in the design aspect of gardening than she ever did. Does that make my garden somehow better than hers? No! I will use an analogy to explain the way I look at the comparison. A single violin can produce the most beautiful music. So can a full orchestra. The mix of different musical instruments in an orchestra adds complexity through layers of sound, but the music is not necessarily more appealing than a haunting melody played on a single violin. My mother prefers the violin. I like to mess about with orchestral pieces. For me the design aspect of gardening adds an interesting level of complexity to more straightforward flower gardening. It is your turn to have your say. Who or what have been your biggest influences in the way you approach gardening?
The side yard has been completed. The pea gravel pathway is retained by pressure treated fence boards along the existing fenceline, and Antique Carriage Edge along the lawn areas. The perennials will take about 3 years to mature, and the groundcovers will cover the pea gravel and fill in between the stepping stones. The existing catch basin for the downspout is hidden beneath the landscape fabric and pea gravel, and a rock was placed below the downspout to disperse water so the pea gravel isn't washed out. The client will never have to walk through mud in this area again. The swale between the properties was over-seeded and topdressed to repair the damage during construction.
Decatur, Ga. Photo: Robert Rausch for The New York Times
Gallery of the best side yard ideas including fences, paths, patios and landscaping ideas to make your side yard awesome!
Not everyone has the land available to create a grand entrance to their back garden.If you live in a suburban community, it is very likely that there are two na…
Welcome visitors to your home with our front entrance walkway landscaping ideas. Or you can create a garden path with walkway planters.
Lush plantings, custom art pieces, integrated lighting, and more, helped transform this underused backyard into an oasis with seasonal interest.
Take a little-used space and turn it into a private, relaxing domain with these smart solutions for landscaping the side of your house.
Boxwood Landscaping Ideas: Enhance Your Front Yard with Evergreen Elegance. Discover 20 classic and creative ideas to incorporate boxwoods into your landscape design. Get inspired and elevate your home's curb appeal. Click here to explore!
Not everyone has the land available to create a grand entrance to their back garden.If you live in a suburban community, it is very likely that there are two na…
Are you bored with all the cliche landscaping ideas? Take a look at my fern landscaping ideas for inspiration and give your garden a new look.
Learn our favorite ground covers to plant between pavers in the garden for every condition: full sun, partial sun, and shade.
