Transformation Tuesday: A Trio of Russian Sage

The client contacted us about doing landscaping in several areas of their yard. The yard had minor landscaping (a few trees and shrubs), but the client wanted an upgrade.

The first step in this transformation was to prep the area but we had to keep the three Russian sages and the flowering plum. We left those plants alone and carefully removed the wild grasses. Once all the vegetation was cleared, it was time to start trenching for the block flowerbed. The flowerbed was going to be only slightly elevated above the rest of the yard. A raised flowerbed helps to make the yard look bigger, more sophisticated, and creates a clear delineation between the hardscape and the softer textures of the plants.

Once the block was stacked and leveled, as well as the caps cut and glued, it was time to level out the flowerbed. Fill dirt was used to help level out the flowerbed, with amendments added to the areas that would be planted. Plants with different colors and bloom times were chosen to maximize the beauty of this area.

The importance of staggering bloom times cannot be overstated.

If you choose plants that all bloom at the same time, your yard is going to look amazing for a short period of time, then be completely devoid of flowers for the rest of the season. We planted another flowering plum in order to help balance out the flowerbed. Once the yarrow, Karl forester, Texas sage, moonlight broom, and lavender were planted it was time to do the flagstone patio.

Although it is a little hard to see in the picture, the round flagstone patio was cut, leveled, and installed. The last step was to roll out the weed barrier and spread the gravel. In addition, the design for the yard purposely used 2different colors and sizes of gravel, which added great contrast to the yard.