The Designed Landscape
by Judith Irven  

The designed landscape is garden space created for and by people. As we evolve our outdoor spaces we instinctively look to the wider landscape and the natural world for inspiration, but ultimately our gardens must also be designed to meet our human needs. This can become a delicate balancing act.

Just as your home is unique and individually yours, so your garden becomes a personal expression of your desires and pleasures. Think of your garden as an extension of your home, an oasis, and, most of all, a place that gives pleasure to you and your family.

Garden is akin to home making. Both can be wonderful journeys of discovery where you can experiment with new ideas and sometimes revisit earlier decisions, both large and small. While mistakes may be made, such as the color of a wall or pattern for curtains, or the placement of a shrub or the grouping of perennials, it is never disastrous or impossible to be remedy. My suggestion is to enjoy the process. Oftentimes, a pleasing journey is more important than the perfect destination.

While there are no hard and fast rules of right or wrong, good or bad, when it comes to garden making, it often helps to look again at your outdoor world through new eyes, to assess and evaluate, to fantasize and dream. I use the three basic design principles of function, form, and flow to conceptually examine the structure of a garden. Let’s briefly look at each in turn, and how they can help you analyze your own garden.

FUNCTION

Function relates to how you use your garden. A good starting place for examining your garden is to make sure your outdoor spaces work right! Look at these functional aspects of your garden:

Outdoor features for everyday living : If you want your garden to be an extension of your home, ask yourself whether your garden currently includes features that you would like to use each day during the summer months. For my own garden this includes: an inviting entranceway, a relaxing patio, a convenient kitchen garden, and, more recently, a screened gazebo. You may have others, such as play areas for children or gardens set aside for special plant collections.

Accessibility and getting around : We need to be able to get quickly and easily to useful things, but probably also want to be able to stroll gently past the flowers! So look at your walkways and paths:

• Straight hardscape paths work best to get from the kitchen door to things like the herb garden, woodshed and kitchen compost.

• Curved paths, or even a stepping stone path through the flowerbed, are more pleasant for a leisurely stroll

Scale and sizing : Gardens are for people, and the scale of all components must be appropriate for human activities.

Make entrance and functional paths between 4 and 5’ wide, so that two people can walk side-by-side:. However strolling paths for a single person can be between 2’ to 3’ wide.

Use accepted standards for riser to tread ratios on steps

FORM

Next, look at the structure and aesthetics of your existing garden spaces.

• Pleasing shapes on the ground : Examine the shapes traced by hardscape, beds and lawn. Each should be attractive and also work functionally
  
• Vertical elements : These add drama and stature, and help define the shapes on the ground. Many gardens lack enough vertical structure. Be bold! Vertical elements include trees, shrubs, fences and garden structures.
  
• Focal points . Does your garden have one or two well positioned focal points? These are often the first things we see upon entering a garden. They draw our eye and beckon us to explore further. It is also good to have a focal point you can see from the outdoor sitting area and from one or more rooms of the house. Focal points often convey a ‘mood’. Examples include an interesting rock, artwork, a garden structure or a distant mountain.
  
• Enclosures : Enclosures delineate internal garden rooms and also separate private space from public thoroughfare. Create enclosures with plantings, walls or fences.

FLOW

The overall garden spaces should be a harmonious and integral whole. Look at overall connectivity and flow of both your paths and spatial layout throughout the property. Could changes be made to improve these aspects of your overall design?

• Paths and movement : Mentally ‘walk the garden’. Do the paths and other walkways make a smooth flowing pattern on the ground? Can you easily access every part of the property?
  
• Spatial connectivity : Look down at your garden from an upstairs window. Do the individual spaces flow together as a harmonious entity? Is there a balance between lawn, hardscape and planted area?

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