When I moved into my newly constructed home 20 years ago, I truly questioned whether or not I could transform the front property from cold, characterless and barren into something warm and welcoming
I finally completed my front garden makeover five years later with the help and advice of a good friend, Chris Woods, an English-bred gardener (and now executive director of the prestigious Chanticleer Gardens, located outside Philadelphia), who taught me a valuable lesson about front gardens: 'It isn't necessary to use evergreen material to make a front yard look beautiful,' he told me. 'You have to train yourself to stop believing that evergreens should automatically be placed in the front of a house.'
Now, this doesn't mean that evergreens don't serve a purpose. I learned over the years that evergreens like boxwoods and junipers are essential in adding structure and visual continuity to the landscape. But since I was so unhappy with my shrubs, I decided on a compromise: remove some of the evergreens and add spring- and autumn-blooming perennials. Most importantly, I started to view my front yard as a true garden - not just a place to access my front door. And with that in mind, I began to create the English garden of my dreams - right in my front yard.
Cottage-Garden Perennials
One of the first things I wanted to do in my front yard was create a romantic cottage garden reminiscent of some of the great gardens that I had seen in England. To mimic this feel I made a point of limiting my perennials to a colour palette of whites, soft and deep pinks, blues, mauves and purples.
My perennial mix included:
- Heuchera 'Palace Purple': A clump-forming, purple plant with palmate leaves and panicles of small white flowers. It has a height and spread of approximately 18 inches. In zone six, the leaves retain their purple colour for at least nine months of the year.
- Violet pansies: Although pansies are not typically considered a perennial in colder climates, they will grow back each spring if the winter is warm enough. In hot humid summers they will die back, but then perk up again in the autumn if kept moist.
- Valerian: Blessed with an incredible fragrance, this prolific self-seeder will grow in almost any soil and thrives nicely in a shady area. Valerian flowers will bloom in red, white or pink.
Some other species I used in the front garden were:
Agastache cana (mosquito plant), clematis vine, camassia, Agastache feoniculum (anise hyssop), phlox sp., echinacea sp., digitalis sp., Knautia macedonia, perennials grasses such as Molinia 'Windspiel' and 'Chasmanthium,' geranium sp., Lavandula 'Provence' (lavender), Nepata 'Dropmore' (catnip), Artemesia 'Powis Castle' and Crambe cordifolia.
The foxglove
One perennial I also used in large number is the foxglove. With its ability to thrive in partial shade, the foxglove is a stunning perennial with tall spikes of tubular flowers that comes in a variety of colours.
To achieve the layered feel that I had been longing for, I planted the foxgloves around my climbing rose bushes (since this picture was taken, the roses have taken over the arbour) and then surrounded the foxgloves with masses of soft pink Echinacea and the purple-magenta perennial, Knautia macedonia. Over the years I have found that using larger numbers of perennials in groupings offers a sense of unity and cohesiveness to the overall feel of the garden. As a rule, I use at least 13 to 15 of one type of perennial in a sweeping motion.
Planting a climbing vine
Years ago I had fallen in love with a picture of an old manor that was covered with roses. It was as if an entirely separate garden was growing on the front wall of the house. I was also intrigued by the lived-in look of the vine-covered homes in England and France. Inspired by these ideas, I began searching for the perfect vine.
Unfortunately, since my home faces north and most vines need a lot of sun, my choices were limited. I finally found the Hydrangea petiolaris, a vine that bears beautiful flattened heads of small white flowers in late spring and early summer. I planted five of these vines and expected them to take off immediately. Instead, it took about three years before my hydrangea vines started growing, but it was worth the wait. Not only are the flowers magnificent, but the leaves, which are very frost hardy, are oval with a shiny green colour. By autumn, the leaves turn a bright orange-yellow.
A winding path
Virtually all of the great gardens of the world have pathways that seamlessly lead from one garden 'room' to another. Before I started this makeover, my garden had only a stone path that led from the driveway to the front door and then abruptly ended. I decided to extend the pathway so that it started at the front of the house and wrapped around the side, spilling out into the back gardens.
Because I wanted to achieve a traditional English garden look, I planted climbing roses so that they would grow over the newly added arbours. The roses I used included: 'Zepherine Drouhin,' a thornless rose bearing lightly fragrant, deep pink flowers in early summer; 'Lavender Lassie,' a lilac-hued rose with extremely fragrant double blossoms; and 'New Dawn,' a fragrant pink rose that will tolerate shade.
Other new plantings included:
- Allium 'Gladiators,' a spherical, purple-headed, spring blooming flower that's a real showstopper when used in abundance in the border.
- Spiraea, a medium-sized bush that blooms profusely with aromatic white flowers in late spring and turns a orange hue by autumn.
- Evergreens, boxwoods and junipers were used along the border and yew bushes were planted along the path to give that area a sense of unity.
Nationally known gardening expert, and author of Digging Deep: Unearthing Your Creative Roots Through Gardening, Fran Sorin is interested in helping women understand themselves in relation to their gardens.
Fran is a CBS Radio News Contributor, the GardenSmart contributor to USA Weekend Magazine, a contributing editor of Radius Magazine and is the Gardening Expert for DIY's 'Home Made Easy' and Comcast's 'Your Morning' Show. Fran has made appearances on 'Regis and Kelly', 'The Today Show', CNN, HGTV and The Discovery Channel.
For more information on Fran, go to her website at: www.fransorin.com