Do-it-yourself landscaping: how to start and how to finish? (33 photos)

Do-it-yourself landscaping is not so difficult to design: patience, materials, work and willingness to learn new things work wonders. However, before starting work in the country, in a small courtyard near the house or in the garden, you need to decide what to actually work on. Typically, a plan is drawn up sequentially, as the importance of the items decreases:

• Collection of information. To make landscaping, you need to know your site well. Before starting development, you need to find out where the shadow is on the site, and where the sun is, whether aggressive winds blow on it, where it is most convenient for people to walk and whether there is a need for drainage ditches. You can pre-estimate: a flower garden will look good here, lighting is needed here, but here you can not do without bushes.
• The buildings. Where will the house be, and where is the bathhouse? Do I need a tool shed or outdoor shower? The buildings will stand in their place for many years, so you need to choose places for them so that you do not regret and damn your plan later.
• Garden. The infield rarely plays an exclusively decorative role. Therefore, you need to decide in advance which plants will be planted and which places are best for them.
• Places of leisure. Playground, barbecue facilities, swimming pool - all this will allow you to have a good time in a close company of friends or family. In private homes can not do without such corners where you can taste the joys of life.
• The tracks. The layout of the site will not be complete if it is inconvenient to get to the other from one part of it. The tracks should be conveniently located - and if you choose a beautiful material for them, they can become a real decoration.
• Ornamental plants. Planning the design of a garden plot cannot do without plants - flower beds and a lawn are indispensable in giving originality.
• Decorative ornaments. Waterfall? Alpine slide? Little garden gnomes, located in a circle and good-naturedly looking at each incoming? All of these options require a small investment of effort, but they can dramatically change the appearance of the site.

To design a private house was attractive and everything in it was in place, you need to move exactly according to plan - and take into account all the features of the elements that can be added to it.

Buildings and useful plants

Often, do-it-yourself landscaping does not imply construction - everything is already there, you just need to put it in order. In any case, regardless of whether there is a construction site on the site or if you have to create them again, they must comply with the basic rules:

• Cleanliness and accuracy are the key to beauty. A house on a summer cottage of 12 acres or 20 acres can be small, can be old or very comfortable, as well as a bathhouse and a shower. But even if there is no money to remake them completely, they need to be clean and tidy. No cracks, paint falling off, bursting platbands. Everything needs to be cleaned out.
• Compatibility is very important. On the site where the house is made in the Provence style, it looks unusual and stylish, a barn for instruments of a classic rustic look or, especially, with Gothic decorations will be inappropriate. The style should match, the colors should not be knocked out. If there is a pattern on one building, the same should be on the others.
• Relevance is hard to overestimate. The garage, pushed into the far corner, will not be able to become part of the composition. Outdoor shower, located in a prominent place. in the middle of the flower garden, it will look silly. For the design of the site, it is very important that the house is in the middle, the shower takes place in the shade of the garden, and the garage is located so that it is convenient to drive into.

If a person has several hundred hectares of land, the desire to place on it not only a sauna and an elongated flower garden is more than natural. However, to make the garden look stylish and not out of the general concept, you need:

• Take a specific place for them. 20 acres or 12 acres, neatly planted with cucumbers, tomatoes and cabbage will not damage the design, but random plantings scattered throughout the site will damage.
• Refine them whenever possible. A beautiful wrought-iron fence, even rows of beds with tablets, tied trees, planted flowers - all this will not harm the growth of useful plants, but will make them much more aesthetic.

Household parts of the design are often very far from fashion trends, but clean, neat, made in the same style, they do not catch the eye, but become a kind of background for elaborate and tastefully selected jewelry.

Leisure and track elements

The landscape design of the personal plot must necessarily take into account the elements of leisure, without which the life of the inhabitants of the house will be boring. It can be:

• Playground. If there are children in the house, they will definitely like the foothold for the game. It should have a sandbox (sand is inexpensive), a simple swing (the simplest are made of a tire attached to a thick branch) and, possibly, a slide. If finances allow, you can supplement the site with a carousel, and if experience allows, you can make a tree house. The main thing is that all this be combined with each other.
• Brazier. A place for grilling kebabs will definitely be a success in adults. It is better to place it in a secluded corner of the garden, away from neighboring eyes.
• Pool. Landscaping with a pool should be designed so that the pool also fits in. If the garden uses natural stone paths, the pool can be overlaid with it. If the pool sparkles in the sun with blue tiles, you can plant nearby flowers in tone.

In addition, all types of landscape design should include paths - the materials for them can serve:

• A natural stone. The material is eco-friendly, beautiful and durable, but expensive, heavy and prone to icing in winter. Landscaping in the Provence style will greatly benefit from the use of stone.
• Wood. The material is also eco-friendly, noble, beautiful. It dries quickly, provides a large number of options, but in a few years comes into complete disrepair.
• Tile. The material is easy to install, beautiful, durable, but expensive. The landscape design of the summer cottage will benefit from the use of tiles, as well as the landscape design of a country house, since the variety of its colors and the ability to make a custom drawing allow the imagination to work without restrictions.
• Brick. Modern landscaping allows the use of bricks - it is a durable, beautiful material, which, however, is expensive. Issue them 12 acres, and even more so, 20 acres will cost a tidy sum.
• Concrete. Not the most beautiful option, but durable, durable and resistant to environmental influences. The world, however, knows examples of concrete walkways made in accordance with fashion trends that adorn the landscape design of the garden.
• Gravel. The landscape design of the small plot more than allows gravel paths. They will look beautiful - not just as straight lines, but as winding paths. The solution, however, is short-lived and not very convenient - only for hiking.
• Plastic. The landscape design of a country house may include plastic tracks.They can be of any color and shape, and even an inexperienced person will not have a question how to make them passable. Once done, they do not rot, but quickly fade in the sun.
• Grass. Special lawn grass can be in the landscape design of the courtyard of a private house. It looks aesthetically pleasing, does not require special care, goes well with other materials. Her only misfortune - she quickly trampled down.

It is important to remember that the paths in the summer cottage should be accompanied by lighting. Can be used:

• Luminous tile. This is one of the best ideas for arranging a cottage site - it is worth turning on the lights, and the whole garden will be filled with a mysterious radiance of soft lighting.
• Flashlights. Small lanterns that can be hidden in the grass also look festive and can help make the design of the site with your own hands a truly aesthetic.
• Lanterns. Tall lights, similar to park ones, are not suitable for illuminating a six-hundred-square-meter plot, but they are ideal for decorating and lighting a large garden.

The combination of lighting, paths and leisure elements will allow you to create a kind of frame in which you can fit both coniferous and ornamental shrubs, and any plants in landscape design.

Decorative ornaments

Ideas of landscape design of a summer cottage necessarily include decorative plants:

• The trees. On a large plot, a weeping willow that draws branches to an artificial pond can become the center of the composition, and a thin birch can truly decorate the landscape design of the site with its leaves, trunk, and catkins.
• Shrubs. These plants for landscaping can be made into a hedge, you can cut out the shapes of animals from them, you can even make a real labyrinth out of them.
• Flowers These plants for landscaping can act as flower beds. You can put them in pots and in tall pots. The main thing is that they harmonize in color with the environment.

In addition to plants, landscape design of a garden, garden or just a plot may include:

• Waterfall in landscaping. Will create a feeling of wildness and freedom.
• Pond. It can become a home for real fish.
• Alpine hill. Combines stones, plants and a small pond.
• Figurines. They can stand in the most unexpected places.

There are a lot of elements to diversify the design. Proper combination of them is the key to success. You should choose a single style, do not use too many elements and give preference to convenience over aesthetics, then the design will be magnificent.