thisplace.com.au - Landscaping Your Front Yard

(Ray R. Rothenberger, Department of Horticulture, University of Missouri-Columbia)

Each home and its landscape should be a reflection of the people who live there. The front yard is the visitor's first impression of the home and its inhabitants. When first seen, it should be inviting and direct the guest easily to the front door. The purpose of this publication is to be not so much a recipe for the development of the front yard as an explanation of the why's and a description of the planning process. Drawings are included as examples, to illustrate concepts, but should not be interpreted as exact arrangements to be copied.

Planning the front yard

Developing the Landscape Plan, provides information for making a base plan from which to work. Future ideas and arrangements may be sketched on tracing paper placed over this base plan. The plan may be developed over a period of weeks or months and planting done in stages over several weeks or several years.

As you plan your front yard, keep a sharp watch for well-done landscapes in your neighborhood or town. Borrow landscaping books from the library and study pictures of homes in magazines. You will find many ideas and concepts represented. Many will not fit your own situation, but they will help to give insights and ideas for designing your own front yard.

Look at the front yard for what it really is: (1) the public view of the house, (2) the family view of the neighborhood, (3) a route of access to and from the house, (4) a useful area and (5) part of our physical and social environment. Plantings should make the home attractive and compatible with the neighborhood as well as satisfy the family's needs.

The most common idea of the front yard is a grassy open area with trees framing and filling the view along with a planting of shrubs close to the house (see Figure 1). This simple concept of the front yard gives a basis from which to begin.

Figure 1. Lawn, shrubs and trees combine for attractive front planting.

Structural features

Before considering the plant arrangements in the front yard, give special attention to the structural features. The two most basic are driveway and walk. In many cases, these are already built when the house is purchased. Make sure they are located properly on the base plan. If their position can be chosen before construction, keep several factors in mind:

» Walks and drives should not cut the front area into small sections.

» Minimum width for a drive should be 10 feet, preferably 11. If the drive also doubles as a walk, add 3 feet of width.

» Walks should be a minimum of 4 feet wide and at least 6 feet from the house.

» Make all walks and drives as direct as possible. Don't curve or bend them unless some physical characteristic of the land dictates it; make curves seem natural and logical.

» Rural drives must sometimes accommodate machinery. The drive may need to be wider than 10 feet and there should be no plants or obstructions for a minimum width of 15 feet.

» Provide drainage for drives and walks with a minimum drop of 1 inch every 10 feet.

The land should have a general slope away from the house. Land not properly sloped should be graded so water drains away from the house and doesn't stand around the foundation. If the slope of the land is steep, it may have to be graded into a series of terraces. In some cases a retaining wall must be built to make the land more attractive, usable and to prevent erosion.

Other structural features, such as fences and screens, may occasionally be appropriate in the public area. An open area is best, and where these structures are not absolutely necessary, they should be avoided. However, if privacy is needed, or if an attractive view must be developed for a front picture window, proper use of a screen or baffle for a background can add individuality to the design.

Unsatisfactory landscape features may exist, and the family budget may not be able to meet the cost of immediate change. Open ditches, steep terraces or overhead utility lines can create problems. Plants may often help hide them or partially break their view. A good time to begin landscape planning if at all possible is when the new home is being built. Only then can the best possible use of outdoor space be obtained as the house and landscape are planned together.

Often a mistake is made by scattering an assortment of unrelated plants about the open area of the front yard. This approach usually fails to allow for full appreciation of the plants regardless of their individual beauty.

Lawn and trees

Basic to most home landscapes are lawn and trees. Lawn ties all landscape features together and gives stability to the soil to prevent erosion. It eliminates dust and mud problems and for most owners of a new home is the first landscape feature added.

Trees are slow to develop to their most useful size; therefore, they should be one of the first plantings in a landscape that is to be developed over a period of years. Trees are used for shade, framing, screening and background.

Doorway (entrance) plantings

Next in importance for development in the front yard is the doorway. Large older homes and formal landscapes have upright shrubs near the entrance to symbolize a sentinel and strengthen the "gate" effect. Modern homes rarely benefit from upright or pyramidal shrubs near the entrance. Shrubs with special foliage or color interest in small or medium sizes with spreading or rounded forms are more appropriate.

The entrance planting should help direct attention to the door. Use plants with year-round interest, because they are seen closely and many times. Plants alongside the door should not be taller than one-fourth to one-third the distance from ground to the eaves. Choose plants that are in proportion with the entrance, don't crowd people coming and going and don't have to be deformed by excessive pruning.

It is not necessary to use the same plant on either side of the doorway unless the planting is formal. The base of the front door should be at the bottom of a "V" formed by the tops of the plants. The tallest plants at the ends of the "V" should be no taller than two-thirds the height of the corners of the house. This is shown in Figure 2. Plants in front of the house should roughly conform to the heights dictated by this "V". Select plants for the entrance that don't quickly become too large. A door close to a corner may require a large plant close by.

Figure 2. "V" effect in the front planting with entrance at bottom. Note: plants need not completely fill in the "V" formed.

Corner plantings

After ideas for the entrance planting are in mind the corner planting should be considered. It must blend with the entrance planting. Corners are one of the most important areas of the "foundation" planting. Houses appear awkward and bare without plantings at the corners.

Corner plantings should actually be plant groupings and should extend beyond the corner of the house. A single plant at a corner does not extend the house or tie the landscape together but accents only the end of the house. The larger the home, and the higher the roof, the greater the need for adequate corner plantings.

In addition to other functions, the corner planting can screen side yards, as well as curve forward to join, or give the illusion of joining, other plantings. Small trees may sometimes be included in the corner planting of large houses. The largest shrub in the corner planting should have a maximum height of about two-thirds the height of the house.

The best corner planting combines plants of three height groups: tall, medium and low (Figure 3). If the house is low, and combinations of three plant sizes would be too massive, use only the medium and low combination and have the tallest mature plants no more than one-half the distance from the eaves to the ground line. A typical combination corner planting includes one tall shrub or small tree with one or two medium-sized shrubs and three to five low shrubs. A minimum planting for a small house might combine one medium shrub with two low shrubs.

Figure 3. Combine tall, medium and low plants in the corner planting.

Add interest with a tall deciduous shrub in combination with smaller evergreen types. Don't use tall plants in locations where they will eventually cover windows. If a window is at the corner of the house, use only low shrubs and extend them to a small tree located out from the house to act as a framing unit to be viewed from the window (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Planting suitable for corner window. Groundcovers or mulch can be used to tie the planting together.

The overall effect of the corner planting should be a stepped-up effect as we reach the corner leading to the tallest shrubs, then a stepped-down effect as we lead away from the house. Extremely upright plants at the corners tend to chop off the end of the house and therefore provide a too-strong accent. For extremely tall buildings or homes, a grouping of several upright plants along with smaller plants may provide needed height without a strong, single, vertical accent.

The tall, two-story house needs more, and taller, plantings. Usually the corner planting should be extended to a tree at the side of the house. Start the planting near the corner with shrubs that reach no more than two-thirds the distance from the first to second floor. Extend the corner planting so plant height angles upward toward the tree (Figure 5). This produces a "V" effect beyond the house that leads downward to the front door. On a very narrow lot it may mean placing small trees fairly close to the house corners to frame the house as well as complete the corner plantings.

Figure 5. The corner planting may extend the "V" form well beyond the house.

"Foundation" planting

In the early 1900s homes were built with exposed foundations 15 to 30 inches high. Tall shrubs were used to hide foundations and to conceal the underpinnings and barren earth beneath porches. Construction practices have changed, but unnecessary use of large shrubs hangs on. Today, foundations are only slightly visible and often completely concealed. There is no need to hide large areas of the house front with plants.

The purpose of the modern front or "foundation" planting is to break the long horizontal lines of the house and to provide a pleasing change from the vertical house front into the level lawn area. The foundation is a composite planting of the doorway planting, the corner and a transition area that joins them. As a unit, the foundation planting leads the eye toward the front door.

Where the house is small with attractive siding, there may not be a need for plants between the entrance planting and the corner planting. Only if this space is exceptionally long may some plants be used to break the long line. Avoid long rows of the same type of plant to fill these areas. In some situations a bed of groundcover or mulch may be all that is necessary to tie the entrance planting and corner plantings together and also make maintenance and mowing easier.

Don't locate plants other than groundcovers within 1-1/2 feet of the foundation where the soil is often too dry for good plant growth. Plants should be far enough from the house to avoid growing against the house and to maintain good air circulation. For spreading shrubs, allow for width equal to the eventual height. Make special allowances for shrubs you know to be very low but extremely spreading. Good spacing is important to prevent later crowding and excess pruning.

Groundcovers used in association with the foundation planting can create unity among groups of shrubs or among trees and shrubs. A continuous cover of one kind of low plant can bind unlike plants together, produce free-flowing lines and provide a natural and attractive edging for the lawn.

Mulches function in much the same way as groundcovers in tying plant materials together. However, they offer other colors and textures. The inert nature of natural mulches generally creates a more woodsy feeling and thus belongs to more informal settings.

Porch plantings follow the same basic concepts of the front "foundation" planting. Corners are still done in the same way. At an inside corner where the porch joins the house, plants of varying height should be used to provide the step-down effect. In older houses where a high foundation or open porch base is evident, this may be covered with a row of small shrubs. If the porch base is attractive, there is no need to use plants along the entire porch. High porches and mobile homes that have sound and attractive skirting do not need extensive planting, but may be treated as a house with no foundation showing. Don't use plants that will grow tall enough to hide porch railings or other distinctive architectural features.

Houses with buttresses or "wing-walls" need less planting at corners for the sake of balance, but still need some plants for transition between these features and the rest of the landscape.

The split-level house needs traditional corner plantings, but the tall side of the house will look better with a larger tree extended from the corner planting. The lower end may have the corner planting extended to a smaller tree. Absolute balance using two identical trees is unnecessary.

Accents and specimens

A specimen plant is one used for unique beauty or as an outstanding example of its type. It should have a position of importance and have seasonal interest. A specimen plant may be featured in a prominent location, often in an entrance garden, or as part of the foundation planting near the entrance where it is closely seen. By drawing attention to itself, it draws attention to the entrance. If the plant is not too dominant, it may find a place in the border planting or in a container located near the entrance.

Only one specimen plant of unusual character should be used in the front landscape. Two or more will compete with each other and the house and spoil the overall appearance. The Colorado blue spruce is one of the most popular specimen plants, but its dominance and formal shape make it difficult to use without drawing all attention toward it. It must be given plenty of room and therefore should not be planted close to the front door.

Accent features such as statuary, gazing balls, bird baths and geometric flower beds are distracting and seldom fit the modern front yard.

Screens and borders

Need and long-range maintenance should be considered before planting hedges in the front yard. Unclipped hedges often look unkempt. Those that need shearing give a formal appearance and require regular maintenance. Plant materials must be chosen carefully for hedge plantings.

If the main objective is full privacy, fences or walls, where permitted by local ordinance, may be the best solution. Structural fences and screens can be monotonous and should be broken with planting of trees, shrubs or vines at irregular intervals.

Screens, hedges and tall borders should end 15 to 20 feet from the street for traffic safety. A planting 4 feet high can block the driver's view of the street from the car. Shrubs may be used as driveway entrance markers, but for these same reasons only low-growing types should be selected.

In creating a border along the property line, avoid a great variety of plants. Also, do not simply alternate plants of two or three types. Use masses, groups or lines of several shrubs of the same type, or use different types with similar color and textural characteristics. Don't use identical arrangements on both sides of the yard except in the most formal plantings. Within lines, masses or groupings of plants, allow sufficient space for each to develop its own size, form and growth habit. Border plantings should not be sheared to the same shape and height regardless of type.

Use of flowers

Flowers in the front yard, as any other kind of plant, call for good taste in design. They contribute greater beauty and less confusion if they are integrated into the plan rather than planted wherever there is bare space.

Flowers may be used in the front yard in the border plantings. They may also be related to features such as lamp posts, planters, or to special interest features at the doorway (Figure 6). It is seldom appropriate to plant single rows of flowers along the full length of the driveway.

Figure 6. A single mass of flowers may provide accent close to the entrance.

Don't use geometric beds scattered throughout the lawn or single flowers dotted at intervals between shrubs in the foundation planting. Low flowers may sometimes be grouped as portions of larger mass plantings of shrubs.

A small space used for flowers should contain one basic type or color. Two well-chosen colors in a small space should be the limit. Don't distribute colors so that they alternate in a single row. This provides a choppy effect and competes with the unity of design. In a large border, several colors and types of flowers may be combined to provide seasonal interest.

Most perennial flowers are not suitable for entrance plantings because they are fairly unattractive and uninteresting when not in bloom. Roses are generally not considered front yard material because many people don't keep them in good condition. However, a well-tended plant, such as a free-flowering floribunda rose or striking foliage plant, may be quite acceptable.

Spring-flowering bulbs are often used in the public area because their bright colors after a dull winter give a feeling of welcome. Daffodils may be incorporated into groundcovers and allowed to return year after year. Tulips are best placed in special areas and should be planted in masses of a single color or in color groups.

Porch containers, tubs and window boxes are also sometimes used in the front, where they become part of the landscape. The best rule for their use is to keep them few and simple.

This guide is also available in Portable Document Format. Click the PDF button to the left to get it.

»	Walks and drives should not cut the front area into small sections.
»	Minimum width for a drive should be 10 feet, preferably 11. If the drive also doubles as a walk, add 3 feet of width.
»	Walks should be a minimum of 4 feet wide and at least 6 feet from the house.
»	Make all walks and drives as direct as possible. Don't curve or bend them unless some physical characteristic of the land dictates it; make curves seem natural and logical.
»	Rural drives must sometimes accommodate machinery. The drive may need to be wider than 10 feet and there should be no plants or obstructions for a minimum width of 15 feet.
»	Provide drainage for drives and walks with a minimum drop of 1 inch every 10 feet.