Maria Killam is a blogger, designer and colour expert who lives just outside of Vancouver, BC. Five years ago, she posted about her new house and the garden that needed to be completely ripped out and redesigned.
I live in New York, but offered to help. I designed Maria's entire garden remotely with drawings and photos. Maria wanted the look of a classic English garden that included boxwood because it's green year round. She also wanted a white-on-white color scheme. I gave her two options for the front yard.
I live in New York, but offered to help. I designed Maria's entire garden remotely with drawings and photos. Maria wanted the look of a classic English garden that included boxwood because it's green year round. She also wanted a white-on-white color scheme. I gave her two options for the front yard.
Option 1
.
After
The one lonely post was not beautiful yet, so I recommended that Maria move the downspout and beef it up to 10" and that's what she did.
Before
After
Before (when she took possession)
After
Before
A professionally designed landscape many times will incorporate both curves and straight lines to add a bit of tension.......but that is for another day.
The backyard was even worse than the front yard with half of it covered in concrete. Maria's studio office is behind her home (below):
Before
After
Maria wanted a vegetable garden and she had two out-buildings, one on the left side (the studio above) and a garden shed located on the right (below):
Before
She had a large plum tree in the middle of the yard. As a designer, I rarely if ever never leave a lonely tree planted among the grass and definitely not surrounded by a bed..........unless of course it is a great shade tree................plum trees seem to be a common choice by a novice, to incorporate a new colour into the landscape, however, the best way to make a purple plum tree look like it belongs in the design, it needs to be repeated by other purple shrubs and flowers........another blog altogether.
Not wanting to offend the plum tree gods....I originally incorporated the tree into the design plan.
Then, in the fall when Maria was raking and raking and raking the leaves she emailed me and said "Can I just get this tree taken out of our plan?", I breathed a sigh of relief and I replied "Off with her head".
This is the area in between both out-buildings. I designed a lattice fence to connect them with varying sizes of boxwood & perennials in front of the fencing.
After
Here's the other side of the yard with the plantings in front of the patio.
Maria loves sitting on her sectional to enjoy the white hydrangeas and flowering Japanese Snow Bell tree in front of the sitting area. This is a note from Maria: "Every day I look outside and think of you because I would never have been able to dream up something so beautiful. My readers will occasionally leave me comments saying that since I'm a designer I could have done it myself but you and I both know that isn't true. Working with you was so fabulous because you have the experience to explain the WHY. Why my far-fetched ideas were not as good as yours! And because of that, I have the garden of my dreams." Thank you so much! Maria Killam, Founder and CEO of Understanding Undertones.
If you are building a new house, or planning a new landscape, I would love to help you create the garden of your dreams, you can contact me at mwhite8410@gmail.com. Go here to view my eDesign rates. SaveSave
