RedGage

If you recently bought a new house or just need to upgrade the look of your old home yard, you may want to finish the job all by yourself. In order to do that, you'll have to understand and apply the basic principles of landscape design. They are not too many, neither are they too complicated. Read on and learn about the six most important principles as explained by the leading landscapers in Melbourne.

Setting Up The Focal Point

A focal point is the essential part of your landscaped garden – the one that grabs the attention of the watcher. Imagine yourself walking on the street in front of your property. Think about its curb appeal and what actually is the first thing that you notice when looking at the green space? Focal points may occur naturally (large trees) or they can be intentionally created by the landscape designer – benches, fountains and more. Keep in mind that a larger yard may need more than one single central spot. Once you've cleared up all the details concerning the focal point, you may go on and start developing other design elements around it.

Landscaping & Proportions

Remember that sizes do matter in landscaping. You'll have to think about scale, symmetry and proportions whenever you add a new element to your new design. Width, height and depth should always be respected in order to make an element adequate to its environment. Proficient landscaping architects from Melbourne stress that it's not a good idea to build a large water feature in a small yard, or to only have a tiny group of flowers in the middle of a vast lawn.

Colour Range

Using colour combinations is a clever way to add layers to your landscape design and make it look sophisticated. Again, you can consider contrasting shades or a mix of darker and lighter hues of the same colour. When it comes to design, working with colours and creating attractive schemes is a whole science, so you may need to spend more time experimenting until you master your skills.

Plant Clusters

As you may have already noticed, all the principles explained in this article work best together and really can't be applied separately. Same is valid for the this one, which relates to plant grouping. In a nutshell, if you want to form a cluster that contains two or more items placed closely, you have to again keep an eye on size, colour and scale. Taking all of them into consideration will enable you to create professional-looking design components.

The Texture

This landscaping rule affects the selection of plants that will grow in the garden. Texture is mostly determined by the key properties of greenery such as shape, size and colour. Unless you're thinking of some weird landscaped garden, you should pay attention to the visible surface of grass and shrubs – do they look smooth or rather coarse? Basically, there are two ways you can implement this principle – you can either boost the contrast between the focal point and surrounding vegetation or you can alternatively make them complement one another.

Finishing Touches

If you have understood all of the above rules, it's time to try and use the last few tricks of modern landscape design. Repetition is one of them – it means incorporating the same element at a couple of spots across the big picture. It may sound very simple but it's far from being an easy job. Overuse of this principle can ruin your whole concept. When applied properly, the repeating of certain items creates a sense of sequence when walking through the landscaped area.