Many home and business owners especially in Melbourne may believe that landscaping is purely for aesthetic appearances, but it goes far beyond looks. There are numerous benefits to landscaping, both residential and commercial. With professional landscaping services, home and business owners can achieve a great-looking, sustainable and functional landscape.
Aesthetic Benefits of Professional Commercial and Residential Landscaping
The first details many onlookers notice about a professionally designed and maintained landscape are the lushness of the grass, the lines of the pathways, the well-trimmed hedges and trees, the colorful flowerbeds and the water features of decorative accessories. Landscapes full of flowerbeds can create wonderful smells as well as stunning colors but the benefits of landscaping go far beyond what human senses perceive.
Environmental Benefits of Professional Commercial and Residential Landscaping
There are numerous environmental benefits to professionally designed and maintained residential and commercial landscaping. Landscaping services work with home and business owners to create a landscape that meets all of their needs while also benefiting the environment. Environmental benefits of landscaping include a cleaner environment with grass, shrubs, flowers and trees help capture pollutants and dust. Grass and other plants produce oxygen, which all living things need to survive.
Along with producing oxygen, grasses and plants absorb carbon dioxide. They then transform it into oxygen and carbon, providing ample oxygen for the property owners. Underfoot, grass is cooler than hard, non-porous surfaces such as cement and asphalt. Properties with grass lawns can experience a cooling effect that keeps the surface at least 20-30 degrees cooler than asphalt or bare soil. A property with trees that provide shade to the building structures may also experience a reduction in interior temperatures.
Professional Commercial and Residential Landscaping Minimises Noise
Hard surfaces such as pavement and concrete can increase noise levels, but properties with landscaped lawns, trees and other plants significantly decrease noise levels and pollution. Landscaping that contains grass, trees, plants absorb potentially harmful runoff, and helps filter it, keeping water supplies healthier. During times of water restriction, maintaining a landscape with sustainable practices is vitally important. Residential landscaping services and commercial landscaping services ensure that a property retains its appearance and environmental benefits without straining the water supply.
Urban Landscaping Benefits
Urban areas can benefit greatly from landscaping services. Creating areas full of grass, plants and tree canopies helps prevent runoff erosion, provides shade to reduce surface temperatures and reduces noise pollution. Incorporating a lush landscaped area in a commercial area offers an oasis that benefits humans and the environment. Viewing trees, plants and greenspaces can lower stress levels and reduce blood pressure. Strolling through landscapes, even small ones in a busy city, can improve attention span and memory retention. Creating green spaces in a community can reduce stress and have a positive impact on quality of life.
Commercial Landscaping Benefits
Commercial landscaping can have several benefits for business owners. High-quality landscaping around a building can increase the number of businesses renting space within it. Tree canopies and lush landscaping can encourage shoppers to travel further, stay longer and spend more money at businesses. Employees who can view a well-maintained commercial landscape from their windows or enjoy it during breaks can experience greater job satisfaction, quality of life and improved health. People seeking an apartment are willing to pay more for a residence with quality landscaping and greater access to green space.
Gardens represent the personal aesthetic of the homeowner with consideration to the exterior environment. The very idea that there is one way to create a garden seems almost insane. And the range of prescriptions about how it should be done—from conventional wisdom such as planting tall plants in the back of the border and short ones in front, to the ironclad strictures of codes, covenants, and restrictions—will stir the rebel impulse in any creative soul. However, here is a basic guide to your dream garden.
Regulating Line
The idea is that an element of architecture example, a doorway, or a building edge, even a window mullion or a distinctive landscape feature – prominent tree, existing pool, property boundary can “generate” an imaginary line that helps connect and organise the design. The result is orderly and cohesive, even after being softened with planting. A regulating line confers on the work the quality of rhythm. The choice of a regulating line fixes the fundamental geometry of the work on your landscape.
Proportions
Certain rules help refine design. One is the Golden Ratio which is a ratio of proportion that’s been observed in everything from the Great Pyramids at Giza to the Greek Parthenon and has been used throughout history as a guide to a pleasing sense of balance and order. Its counterpart in landscape design is the rectangle ratio. Rectangle ratio is close to 1: 1.6, a proportion regularly used to lay out terraces, patios, arbours, and lawns. .
Sizing
A final rule related to scale and the sculpting of space is this: Go big. Faced with a decision to make a staircase wider or narrower, a pool longer or shorter, a pergola higher or lower, the answer is almost always the former.
Planting
It’s with plants, probably more than any other element of gardens, that the infinite variation and fickleness of nature is most evident—and so perhaps, they are the trickiest to prescribe rules for. And yet, successful planting is the crowning touch of a garden.
First, is to plant big to small: start with trees, then shrubs, then perennials, then ground cover. This is important not only in a compositional way (seeing the bigger forms first gives a better sense of the overall structure), but in a completely practical sense. Setting a big tree may require machinery or at least multiple gardeners and ample space for manoeuvring and stationing amendments and soils; it would be sad to damage or undo some newly planted bed. This seems so obvious, but for lots of gardeners (the author included) a block of fresh perennials may be impossible to avoid planting right away. Be strong; resist the temptation.
While there is much to be said for the cottage garden, with a rich array of varied planting (indeed, it’s the real master gardener who can pull this off), there is a power to seeing a quantity of one plant that is genuinely affecting.
Entrust your landscaping project to Mark Browning Landscape Design. We are ready to help you with your landscaping projects. Contact us to know more about landscaping and if you want to transform your backyard into something relaxing and refreshing.
Sustainable landscaping requires only inputs that are naturally available, with little or no additional support. It is self-sustaining over long periods of time. It exists in harmony with its local ecosystem––if bad weather hits, or wildfires or rockslides devastate your neighborhood, your garden recovers quickly. The landscape is diverse enough to remain resilient and productive indefinitely. Taking on a sustainable landscaping task can be the first step for a more sustainable household. Below are some of the most important factors you can apply.
Native Planting
Using native plants of the area on green roofs and the surrounding landscapes will not only help the building perform well, but will also help with maintenance costs of the building they sit on top of. Native, hearty, perennial plants grow back every spring season and will be able to survive the colder months and season changes and help the green roof garden perform efficiently year after year. Using these sustainable landscape practices can have huge advantages for our environment now, and in the years to come, and with our nation going towards green practices every day, designers and contractors really need to start seeing past the dollar figure of these landscapes, and start thinking about the future of our environment and nation as a whole.
Material Reduction
You should reduce the use of synthetic fertilizers. Test the soil to determine if fertilizer is needed, and if the test determines the soil is low in certain nutrients, time the application appropriately to reduce runoff into surface waters. While many people are concerned about pesticides in food, homeowners use 10 times as many pesticides per acre as farmers. Some may assume they are safe, due to their ubiquity. Others may assume that synthetic pesticides – but not natural pesticides – are harmful. The truth is much more complicated and depends on many factors. The bottom line is that, while pesticides kill pests, they can have other unwanted effects. For example, pesticides can harm beneficial insects, such as pollinators and predators, and can result in bird and amphibian deaths. In addition, children and pets are particularly susceptible, as they come in close contact with the lawn, and often put things into their mouths. And since children are still developing, pesticides may affect them differently. Some commonly used lawn pesticides have been shown to be correlated with various cancers and hormonal disruption and should be used with caution, or avoided if possible.
Water Conservation
There are many ways to conserve water in the landscape beyond the lawn. Examples include planting native or drought-tolerant plants, using a rain barrel, planting a rain garden to reduce urban runoff, using mulch, and installing drip irrigation.
Consult us at Mark Browning Landscape Design for your sustainable garden landscape designs. We pride ourselves with sustainable and sensible design principles and we encourage our clients to strike a balance between both hard and soft landscape treatments.
Site analysis is the process of taking pictures of the property and noting all of the key elements on-site such as existing structures and plant material, site views, water issues or anything else that may affect the design. Such a process is important before a landscaping project to ensure a smooth workflow. Below are the other reasons why site analysis is important before a landscaping project.
Site Analysis Can Give You The Basis for a Landscaping Design
A part of the site analysis is figuring out the footprint. Contractors start with the basic dimensions and shape of your property. Then they have a county surveyor for a property sketch that shows the boundaries, setbacks and easements. After they scan or transfer that information they can use that as the basis for your design.
Site Analysis Allows You to Know Which Features to Reuse or Recycle
After they make a list of what is already on your property, including buildings, trees, hardscapes, fences and infrastructure. Then they will be able to tell you what can be reused or recycled as well as which features are liabilities and need to be changed.
Site Analysis Checks if You are Prone to Natural Disasters
The site analysis process informs you of the broad strokes, the high and low points of your property. It notes the distinctive features that will affect what you can do with an area including steep slopes, swails, berms, peaks. If you live in an area prone to natural disasters such as mudslides, sinkholes, floods or wildfires, you can opt for defensive landscaping guidelines.
Site Analysis Troubleshoots Potential Dangers
Making your yard safe is a top priority. That could mean pruning dead tree limbs, repaving walkways to eliminate trip hazards, or enclosing a swimming pool with a safety fence. To troubleshoot potential dangers, site analysis identifies design changes to make before embarking on a landscaping project.
Site Analysis Promotes Proper Irrigation
Site analysis determines the drainage patterns and tests the soil for moisture in various locations around the yard to determine where you can group together plants according to their water needs and then plan your irrigation system accordingly.
Site Analysis Identifies Sun, Shade and Wind Patterns
Site analysis familiarises you with the patterns of sun and shade at different times of the day and season. This will enable you to find the extent of shadows and their density, and where you might want to add or delete shade. Similarly, it identifies the typical wind speeds and direction at different times of year. You can strategically place trees and plants to block wind or funnel it for cooling breezes. As with water, wind settles and pools in low-lying areas. This can create frost pockets where the yard dips. If it’s blocked too much, as by a fence or dense trees, pressure can build up, creating turbulence on the leeward side, which can be destructive.
Site Analysis Reduces Nuisances
While not exactly dangerous, annoying facts of life such as street noise, lettuce-nibbling deer, or a neighbor’s tree that sheds its leaves in your yard, should figure into your landscaping plans. You might not be able to eliminate all nuisances but you’ll be happier if you address them from the start, rather than as an afterthought, and devise creative, sustainable strategies.
Avail of a site analysis before your landscaping project from Mark Browning Landscape Design. We are ready to help you with your landscaping projects. Contact us to know more about landscaping and if you want to transform your backyard into something relaxing and refreshing.
