Beds and flower beds – types, design, fashion trends

Recommendation points

• Design of flower beds and flower beds
• Varieties of flower beds
• Fashionable flower beds and flower beds
• “Spicy” spring flower bed
• The device of the “autumn flower bed” – mixborder with cereals

For a personal plot, flower beds and flower beds are certainly a decoration of the garden. The article will provide practical advice on choosing their form, type and design methods. We will consider fashion trends in the design of flower beds and flower beds, we will tell you how to equip them.

Design of flower beds and flower beds

After the boundaries of the zones and the location of the paths are marked on the site plan, you can start planning flower beds and flower beds. Most often, they are positioned taking into account the functional need, for example, to take up free space near the fence, decorate the recreation area, and disguise the unsightly barn wall. The most beautiful flower beds are positioned taking into account the possibility of viewing from different points of the garden or from the windows of the house.

This approach, embedding flower beds in the overall planning solution, allows you to make the most of the possibilities and area of ​​the site. Curbs and ridges are broken along the edges of the paths, the monotonous green of the lawns is diluted with an intricate arabesque, the most remote and boring corners of the site are turned into mini-gardens with the help of colorful mixborders.

In general, large flower beds and flower beds are drawn to scale, small ones stand out with a color spot. Plants above one and a half meters stand out as a separate sign..

Landscape designers are advised to additionally make sketches for each individual flower garden or flower bed, at least on a free scale. And it is better not to be lazy and make a real sketch with certain boundaries on a scale of 1:50 or 1:25, and draw the area of ​​the flower bed in the form of a grid with a step of 1 cm.

Further, having carefully studied the seasonality and duration of flowering, the height of plants, their compatibility with each other, as if a mosaic can be “assembled” on a sheet of a future flower bed.

Conventionally, all plants during planning can be divided into three types:

1. Accent plants are basic, focusing, accentuating, setting the general mood and color mode. They should be distinguished by their unusual shape, leaf color or large bright flowers..
2. Skeletal plants create a background without focusing on themselves. Their presence on the flowerbed allows you to make it a single whole..
3. Filler Plants perform a decorative role. Very often they are planted just to create a so-called “seasonal outbreak” during their flowering period..

When planning flower beds, the following must be taken into account:

1. Lighting features.
2. Soil moisture level.
3. Soil characteristics (acidity, structural composition, thickness of the fertile layer).

Color planning is very important, as a haphazardly variegated flower bed tires the eyes, creates a feeling of anxiety and tastelessness..

The color scheme depends not only on the preferences of the owner, it must be linked with the general style of the site, taking into account the compatibility of colors, skillfully draw up contrasts.

The background color of the flower bed is almost always green. In the plant world, this color has such a rich color palette, from greenish-blue to pale emerald, that it is worth making the most of the possibilities of this color when choosing skeletal plants..

The basic colors of any flower bed are green, red, blue, yellow, white, silver. On their basis, contrasts are created on the flower bed, or, conversely, harmonious combinations..

For many, the planning stage seems boring and unnecessary. However, a truly interesting flower bed can only be made by observing the color proportions. This is what will allow you to make a plan carefully drawn up on paper, or at least a sketch.

When arranging a flower bed, you should try to use plants that have different flowering periods – annuals, perennials, bulbs. “Carpet” flower beds, where plants with beautiful decorative leaves of different colors are planted, have become very popular..

Varieties of flower beds

Arabesque– flower beds that combine groundcover and flowering plants, planted along lines that form complex patterns and patterns.

Since flowering annuals are most often used for the device of arabesque, such a flower bed will have to be updated every year..

Rabatka– a long flower bed, from 0.5 to 4 meters wide, framing paths, walls of buildings, fences.

Curbs– narrow (up to half a meter) flower beds. They can decorate paths, large flower beds or flower beds..

Mixborder– mixed planting of various flowering and ornamental plants and shrubs in free form. Unlike a flower bed, a mixborder has neither a clearly defined geometry, nor a fence.

Group– an independent composition, planted on a lawn, unlike arabesque, has no clear contours. Mono flower groups and modular groups are very fashionable. They imply repeated repetition through a certain distance of the flower module of the same size and composition..

Tapeworm– a flowerbed with a single plant. It can be some very unusual and large flower or a non-flowering plant with unusual decorative properties..

Rockery– a flower garden, where a stone is taken as the basis of the composition.

Fashionable flower beds and flower beds

“Spicy” spring flower bed

The undoubted hit of the spring season can be the spring “spicy” flower bed. She will not only delight the eye with her bright and elegant look, but also with a harvest of fresh spicy greens.

It is best to allocate a place for a “spicy” flower bed in the fall, it should be in a sunny, high place. You also need to think about what size and appearance it will be. The easiest way is to arrange a square flower bed, you can form it with the help of boards.

In the spring, as soon as the snow melts, all that remains is to correct its contours and make a fence of wood, large cobblestones or gravel.

For a “spicy” flower bed, you must purchase the seeds of the following plants:

• lovage
• basil
• caraway
• tarragon
• oregano
• mint
• Melissa
• coriander
• sage
• rosemary
• hyssop

Sowing time for seedlings is slightly different, but usually it is the end of February-March. Seedlings are grown strictly following the instructions. In open ground in the middle lane, it is possible to plant spicy herbs no earlier than May 10-15, if you do not use film.

Before planting, it is necessary to draw a planting scheme, trying to arrange the plants taking into account their height and color. The higher and stronger the seedling bushes, the brighter and more beautiful the flower bed will be.

The device of the “autumn flower bed” – mixborder with cereals

Mixborders have never gone out of style, but their appearance changes over time. We offer to arrange a mixborder flower bed in autumn style. Its fashionable “highlight” is that only cereals, low-growing shrubs and perennials are used for the arrangement of flower beds, selected in such a way that their flowering period falls on autumn – the time when all other flower beds and flower beds have already ceased to please the eye with bright colors.

Plants are arranged in steps. It is better to choose a place for the device dry, with a good degree of illumination. You can use the corner of the lot near a low fence. The mixborder is quite large, about 6 sq. m.

1. Japanese scarlet plant is planted in the background. 2. Irga of any subspecies – Canadian, round-leaved, spiky. In this case, this tree is planted due to the unusual purple color of fading foliage.. 3, 4. Grain – Chinese miscanthus or purple winter-hardy varieties. 5. Hybrid monards – of any color (there are about seven of them). 6. Mordovnik. 7. Any type of reed grass. 8. Aconites blooming in autumn – Wilson, Wrestler. 9. Autumn Gelenium. 10. Verbena of the autumn flowering period – hard or purple. 11. Rudbeckia glossy, golden. 12. Perennial cereal – rod-shaped millet. 13. Echinocea. 14. Kalina is planted because of the beauty of the fruit and the crimson autumn foliage. The varieties are suitable – ordinary or David. 15. Felt or Japanese anemones of autumn flowering. 16. “Sod pike” or meadow. 17. Kneeless or blue lightning. 18. Large-cup mountain goat. 19. Hakonehloya large. 20. Heuchera saxifrage variegated. 21. Any kind of Japanese sedge. 22. Marigolds (blooming almost to frost). 23. Aster border. 24. Sleep-grass (lumbago). 25.Sedum.

This basic composition of mixborder plants, proposed by a landscape designer, can be changed and supplemented at your own discretion, based on your own experience..

Making a flower bed with your own hands worthy of the high appraisal of a professional is quite achievable. Understanding the general rules and principles will help you create a flower garden of any level of complexity, and we will talk about how to do this in our next article..