The garden space between the street, driveway, walkway and your house offers a formidable first impression to someone arriving to your door. Thomas Church, landscape designer and author of Gardens are for People, wrote this about the importance of a well mannered entry garden:
"The psychology of arrival is more important than one thinks. If it is not obvious where to park, if there is no room to park when you get there, or the entrance is badly lighted, your guests have been subjected to a series of annoyances which will linger long in their subconscious.
No matter how warm your hearth or how beautiful your view, the overall effect will be dimmed by these first irritations. Nothing justifies making an obstacle course out of the trip from the car to the front door.
It will require the finest food and the most comfortable chair to make up for being obliged to walk through mud, or having your hat knocked off by overhanging trees and your stockings ripped on the pyracantha."
Cultivate your entry garden to be a pleasurable experience and not inflict long lasting psychic sorrow. Select a planting palette that offers year-round beauty. Include evergreen trees and shrubs, sculptural branches, colorful twigs, fruits and foliage.
Japanese maples (Acer palmatum) offer a variety of textured and colored foliage as well as sculptural silhouettes in the winter. Under plant with the evergreen foliage of lenten rose (Helleborus) offering early spring blooms.
Witchhazel’s colorful flowers offer a cheery greeting even in the dead of winter. We grow Hamamelis ‘Jelena’ in a stoneware container by our front steps . ‘Jelena’ blooms with coppery orange tassels from January to March.
Next to the witchhazel is one of my favorite broadleaf evergreen shrubs Mahonia bealii the Asian leatherleaf mahonia. The glossy bold leaves are topped with fragrant yellow flowers followed by blue fruit. Combine Mahonia with the fine textured chartreuse foliage of Spiraea thunbergii ‘Ogon’ and variegated compound leaves of five -leaf aralia (Acanthopanax sieboldianus ‘Variegatus’). Long stalk holly’s (Ilex pendunculosa) smooth margined evergreen leaves and pendulous red fruits anchors the corner of our entry planting.
Herbaceous perennials play an important role aside from their colorful blooms. They vanish in the winter and are out of harms way of the snow plow. Bluestar (Amsonia x ‘Seaford Skies) is a excellent choice for planting near a street or driveway. Thriving in full sun to partial shade, Amsonia survives the worst droughts with indestructible foliage that is attractive all summer and turns a beautiful yellow in October. Combine with Geranium Rozanne whose purple flowers will accompany the coloring fall foliage. Add daylilies and daffodils for a full season of color.
Fragrant flowers always offer a delightful greeting. Daphne x transatlanica offers fragrant flowers in late May and a heavy rebloom in September and October. Plant your entry garden for gracious greetings. Knock Knock.
Warren Leach
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