Trees, open spaces, or a distant focal point can be difficult to manage in a small urban lot.  Don't despair.  Your neighbors might have something to offer.

When you are laying out your beds, borders, trees, and shrubs look outside your own boundaries.  Utilize vistas and towering trees into your plan.  Steal a little something from your neighbor's landscape.  If you are lucky enough to have acreage, filch from the surrounding countryside.  I'm not saying to literally take something away, just borrow a vision from outside your boundaries.

If you have open ground next door, leave an opening in your landscape, a sort of window, so that your garden appears to go on and on over hill and dale.  Perhaps there is a view of a mountain, or a cactus in the distance.  Frame them with an opening in a hedge.

A gardener in Anderson, South Carolina, used her neighbors to full advantage.  She has a large suburban lot.  Wide borders of flowers rim the perimeter of the lawn.  Waves of color swell all along her landscape.  She has placed shrubs at the rear, which effectively screen out next-door yards. 

What I find most ingenious is the way she has pulled trees from farther away into her own landscape.  She places her trees in such a way as to connect to those outside.  She has added acreage to her lot without spending a dime or planting an extra tree.

From one view, you see the trees in the distance over her full flowerbeds.  Her garden appears to curve into a wooded area beyond.  When you get to that bend in the garden, the outlying trees combine with her own to give the garden an intimate, enclosed appearance.

Is there a landscape backdrop down your street or road?  A flat landscape is a boring landscape.  A garden should have height as well as color and form.  Study the outer perimeter of your neighborhood.  Look to the sky for trees that will lead the eye up and create more interest.  Is there something down the road you can permanently borrow?

---Posted by Anne K Moore, August 20, 2007---