Structure in Your Garden

When you're done with your winter garden preparations -- but still have a chance to get your shovel into the ground -- it's a good time to be thinking about the infrastructure of your garden.

Rock Garden Design & Construction
Item # 99678 		Rock Garden Design & Construction

each $29.95
Rock Garden Plants
Item # 99679 		Rock Garden Plants: A Color Encyclopedia

each $59.95
  • Topic: Garden Design
  • Keywords: structure, statues, rocks, Garden Design, gardens
  • Date: November 2001

© All articles are copyrighted by High Country Gardens. Republication is prohibited without Permission.

“Boundaries are the garden’s beginnings. To define them is to lay claim to a spot of earth, to signal our intent to cultivate and nurture, to circumscribe our labors. Boundaries protect. They frame. They shelter. They embrace the garden and welcome all who enter.” Linda Joan Smith, Garden Structures

When you’re done with your winter garden preparations—but still have a chance to get your shovel into the ground—it’s a good time to be thinking about the infrastructure of your garden.

Hardscaping—basically the non-plant elements of your garden design—is just as important for the overall feel of your garden, but devoting your growing season energy to it can seem misplaced. So take advantage of this time to lay the groundwork for future hardscaping projects.

There are several excellent books filled with inspiration for your garden plans, but we’ve selected a few of our favorites:

Stone, Rock and Gravel: Natural Features for Modern Gardens, by Kathryn Bradley-Hole. Filled with inspirational gardens and very readable how-to direction for such diverse things as raking gravel in Japanese garden patterns, planning and planting a rock garden, and proper capping of a stone wall. The book itself is beautiful, and makes a nice gift for all the gardeners in your life.

Smith and Hawken Garden Structures by Linda Joan Smith. With every page packed full of pictures of amusing little gates, Oriental motifs,bright blue fences and practical arbor frames, this book is both enchanting and practical. Smith covers the essentials of form and then shows the results when gardeners let their fancies fly. The beautiful results are sure to be a takeoff point for your own structural dreams.

The Art and Craft of Stonescaping: Setting and Stacking Stone by David Reed. The projects in this book are sometimes those that would require real earth movement to create—but what better time to plan for these dramatic changes? If you’re looking for ideas on how to finish the front of your new home, this is the book for you. Very how-to, with no shortage of beautiful examples—why not lay the foundation now for a beautiful pond, or make a simple but elegant stone bench on which to enjoy your garden next year?

Building and Using Cold Frames, by Charles Siegchrist The pamphlets in the Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin series are a steal-only $3.95 for a wealth of information. This particular book tells you how to build an elementary cold frame, and then gives you great tips on how to use it effectively-enabling you to harvest lettuce, onions and radishes for a Thanksgiving salad. Keep in mind that there are quite a few vegetables that can be sown in a cold frame two months before the last spring frost!