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| LANDSCAPE GARDENING |
Landscape
gardening has often been likened to the painting of a picture. Your art-work
teacher has doubtless told you that a good picture should have a point of chief
interest, and the rest of the points simply go to make more beautiful the
central idea, or to form a fine setting for it. So in landscape gardening there
must be in the gardener's mind a picture of what he desires the whole to be
when he completes his work.
From this study
we shall be able to work out a little theory of landscape gardening.
Let us go to the
lawn. A good extent of open lawn space is always beautiful. It is restful. It
adds a feeling of space to even small grounds. So we might generalize and say
that it is well to keep open lawn spaces. If one covers his lawn space with
many trees, with little flower beds here and there, the general effect is
choppy and fussy. It is a bit like an over-dressed person. One's grounds lose
all individuality thus treated. A single tree or a small group is
not a bad arrangement
on the lawn. Do not centre the tree or trees. Let them drop a bit into the
background. Make a pleasing side feature of them.
In choosing trees one must
keep in mind a number of things. You should not choose an overpowering tree;
the tree should be one of good shape, with something interesting about its
bark, leaves, flowers or fruit. While the poplar is a rapid grower, it sheds
its leaves early and so is left standing, bare and ugly, before the fall is
old. Mind you, there are places where a row or double row of Lombardy poplars
is very effective. But I think you'll agree with me that one lone poplar is
not. The catalpa is quite lovely by itself. Its leaves are broad, its flowers
attractive, the seed pods which cling to the tree until away into the winter,
add a bit of picture squeness. The bright berries of the ash, the brilliant
foliage of the sugar maple, the blossoms of the tulip tree, the bark of the
white birch, and the leaves of the copper beech all these are beauty points to
consider.
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| Landscape Gardening |
Place makes a
difference in the selection of a tree. Suppose the lower portion of the grounds
is a bit low and moist, then the spot is ideal for a willow. Don't group trees
together which look awkward. A long-looking poplar does not go with a nice
rather rounded little tulip tree. A juniper, so neat and prim, would look silly
beside a spreading chestnut. One must keep proportion and suitability in mind.
I'd never advise the planting of a group of evergreens close to a house, and in the front yard. The effect is very gloomy indeed. Houses thus surrounded are overcapped by such trees and are not only gloomy to live in, but truly unhealthful. The chief requisite inside a house is sunlight and plenty of it.
As trees are
chosen because of certain good points, so shrubs should be. In a clump I should
wish some which bloomed early, some which bloomed late, some for the beauty of
their fall foliage, some for the color of their bark and others for the fruit.
Some spireas and the forsythia bloom early. The red bark of the dogwood makes a
bit of color all winter, and the red berries of the barberry cling to the
shrub well into the winter.
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