Many houses in Calgary have mundane front yard landscaping – mainly because it’s not usually a top priority for home-owners. However, some residents understand the importance of “the first impression.”

As a full-service landscape design and construction company, we often find that front yards are usually more challenging to design for than backyards. Solely because of scale: front yards have a much smaller area to work with.

However, if you keep the following tips in mind, you can come up with some pretty awesome front yard landscaping ideas to accentuate your biggest investment: your home.

Tip #1: Front yard landscaping has to make sense

During my landscape design studies, one of the underlying concepts we learned was relationships of forms. The dominant, sub-dominant and subordinate design forms, to be exact.

Think about it, when you look at a front yard – what’s the most dominant factor standing out? You guessed it: your house.

You now have this hunk standing on top of your property dominating the space. You have to surround the rest of it to make it make sense.

If there is a slope, I always recommend doing a small retaining wall. To some, spending $3000+ on a tiny front yard may seem crazy, but trust me when I tell you that slopes should always be taken care of with retaining walls in Calgary. This would be your sub-dominant form.

The subordinates are, most often than not, your softscaping: plant materials, groundcover and grass.

Add colour. Depth. Scale. You have to make sure you’re doing this. Otherwise, it’ll look just like another boring front yard.

They seem minor, but they make a big difference!

Tip #2: Clarify access

We’ve all been there. Walking up to a house and pausing for a minute and saying to ourselves: “Wait…Which way is the entrance?”. Sound familiar?

As someone who goes to the homes of Calgary all the time for landscaping consultations, I come across this issue often.

Make sure you direct people to where the entrance is. If you need to build steps because of slopes, do so – but the key is to make sure it’s easily readable because no one likes to walk on your grass. This goes especially when there’s snow or mud on the way to the front door.

By creating clear and concise access for the user, you will have hit the functional part of the front yard landscaping that many often miss.

Tip #3: Frame your house

There is something about the human eye that tends to enjoy symmetry. When I go to a house and want to design a grand entrance or give it an estate feel, I often use big trees to frame in the house. This gives symmetry to the front and invokes an emotion of comfort that smoothes to the space.

By using plant material to bring verticality to the space, your front yard landscaping ideas will start to follow in rhythm. Now, you are understanding the importance of the forms in conjunction with one another and complimenting them accordingly. In this case, with trees.

Tip #4: Borders and edges

This is very similar to the idea of framing but on the ground. Even if you have no grass and only plant material, you must define your groundcover borders.

I love poured decorative concrete curbing. It is not just aesthetic; it makes the planting beds more pronounced. Also, it acts as a very functional element in the landscape by holding in your ground cover. It’s also durable enough so that your lawn-mower doesn’t come in contact with the plant materials.

By investing in curbing, you are now highlighting the subordinate form within your landscape. This can have the front yard looking more vibrant than ever before!

Tip #5: Feature pieces

At Tazscapes, one of Calgary’s leading landscape design companies, we like to propose a feature piece when considering front yard landscaping ideas. Implementing a feature gives the eye something visually appealing to observe.

Often, due to budgetary constraints, I recommend an address boulder.

You can also do something a little more creative, such as front yard privacy landscaping. Use miniature privacy screens – maybe to hide a utility box – and have your address number plated on it.

The lowest-cost option, however, is selecting a specialty tree. Pick something that blooms vividly, like a flowering crab.

Whatever the case, I personally always put something in the front yard to draw the eye to a ‘wow factor.’

And if you need something truly creative, you can reach out to Tazscapes to come by and give you a few incredible proposals!

Artificial turf, artificial grass, synthetic lawn– call it what you want, but fake grass landscaping is starting to take over Calgary!

People are tired of mowing their lawns on a regular basis only to see dull, yellow-patched grass that makes their whole yard look awful. Let’s face it, not everyone has the time or the passion for regular lawn care maintenance.

Enter artificial grass in Calgary. Not only is it zero maintenance, but it keeps your yard looking beautiful and lusciously green year-round. If you have children or pets, this is a great option. But as with anything that makes your life easier, it can be expensive.

Nonetheless, it’s a great investment for your property. Besides the aesthetic value it can give your home, people appreciate not having to water or mow their lawns.

Within the artificial turf realm, you have loads of options. There are many textures and grades that you can choose from depending on your personal needs.

Let’s take a deeper look.

History

The concept of fake grass originally came from a textile company, but the product was meant to be used for carpeting.

Today, new products have been tested and chemically treated so they are resistant to ultraviolet rays of the sun. This makes them wear-and-tear resilient against pet and children foot traffic, and fully applicable for residential Calgary landscaping.

Materiality

There are fibers in the synthetic turf, called blades, which essentially make up the “grass”.

Made from elements like nylon or polypropylene, these are manufactured in different ways for different applications to mimic fake grass.

Installation

When proposing artificial turf to Calgary residents, my clients often wonder why it’s so expensive. In their mind, we’re simply “rolling out carpet”, similar to sod.

The difference that many fail to realize is that unlike sod, proper Calgary landscaping practices require a solid 6”-8” aggregate base. This is more like the process involved in paving stones or concrete curbing. Excavation and grading to ensure proper drainage also allows it to become synthetic perfect turf.

Applications

I often recommend artificial turf in Calgary yards where home-owners who want luscious green lawn without worrying about maintenance.

In addition, clients who have pets that tend to make a mess benefit significantly from fake grass– even if it’s for a small area like a dog-run.

The most popular reason clients select fake grass is for putting greens.

Putting greens in Calgary have become a great landscape feature. Home-owners can finally have a place to ‘play’ as they entertain their guests. Golfers also now have the ability to practice their game in the convenience of their own backyard.

I will really try to push the fake grass concept to clients in my landscape design proposal if I feel that their lawn area is small or needs grass installed. Think about it, do you really want to bring out a lawn mower or hose for an 80, or even 150 square foot area?

If so, what are the chances it will be as green and appear as healthy as the synthetic form I propose?

However, there is also something about natural grass that some clients prefer: the “connection to earth”, if you will.

I honestly can’t say if playing in natural grass or mud – as doctors tell us – built my immune system at an early age.

The choice is yours nonetheless. The benefits are there!

If you’re looking to keep your lawn a maintenance-free one and aesthetically superior, I would highly recommend it. On the other hand, if budget is a concern and/or if you enjoy the natural look and feel of the outdoors, stick to regular sod.

At Tazscapes, we have expertly installed loads of artificial turf in Calgary, and can help you with yours.

Feel free to give us a call today for your new maintenance-free lawn!

As a trained landscape designer, I regularly visit home-owners to help them with Calgary backyard landscaping ideas.

I’m often amazed that the first thing they do is take me to their space and begin complaining about what they have to work with.

However, where people see constraints, I see opportunity. It’s just how I was trained!

Here are my top five tips to home-owners who want to know how to propose landscaping ideas for backyards:

Tip #1: Know and understand your lifestyle

Not everyone needs a fire pit. That’s just an example, but it’s one that stands out at me among the thousands of home-owners I’ve met. Everyone says they want a fire pit, or rather, everyone feels like they need a fire pit.

Don’t get me wrong, fire pits are great. Along with proper lighting and water fixtures, the addition of a fire feature can take your backyard to another level. Their ability to hit key emotional triggers make them perfect for a cozy space.

However, you should not be spending thousands of dollars for a yard that has no use in your everyday life.

Many Calgary landscaping companies (not all) tend to do the same cookie cutter tactics in every backyard they enter. Why? Because it’s easy.

Their crews know it, the product is readily available and they can get it done with their eyes closed. On top of that, they charge you the same as someone who proposes a more intricate project.

I can’t tell you how many landscaping contractors in Calgary will propose a 12’ diameter circle paving stone kit with a central stack-stone fire pit.

Don’t get me wrong. This is something I too have proposed in the past. However, only when I deem it necessary for the particular yard, as per the client’s lifestyle.

Simply put, you have to propose a landscape design for your yard so it will be a useable space for you, your family and your friends.

Questions you should be asking yourself first and foremost are:

How many people will we entertain?
What will we be doing out here?
What time of day are we most likely going to be out here?
Do we have children? Pets?
How much time are we spending outdoors?
Is this for mostly Weekdays? Or weekends?
Who is going to maintain this yard for years to come, so our money isn’t wasted?

By understanding your lifestyle first, you can then move on to the next step of actually come up with landscaping ideas for your backyard!

Tip #2: Mark your destination points

One of the worst things you can do is have Joe Blow landscaping company design your backyard for you. Do yourself a big service and hire a professional landscape design company in Calgary. This is worth the investment – you’ll save yourself a lot of headaches later, trust me.

A destination point is where you or your family will be engaging with your landscape. I tend to lean toward the three most common points of interest: cooking, dining, and lounging.

Know your destination points. This will give you a great framework to work with when trying to figure out different ideas for your backyard landscaping. This may also open doors for you to look into landscaping features such as outdoor kitchens, privacy screens, fireplaces, and water features.

Tip #3: Mark your transition points

Once you have your destination points marked, i.e. What you want and where you want them placed in your backyard, you need to tie them with one another.

One thing I often see landscape contractors do is “plop” things anywhere in the yard without understanding proper circulation patterns.

There needs to be a flow in the yard. How do you get from one place to the next? Does it make sense to place the outdoor kitchen 20 feet away from the back door so you can’t conveniently get to your barbecue in the winter, for example? Understanding proper circulation patterns will allow you to tie in your destination points, thus giving your transition points a very experiential tone.

Choice of plant material becomes essential as well here. Colour schemes and scales also play a big part. Also, considering the selection of ground-cover and borders to outline those transitional spaces is important.

Tip #4: Inside to outside

I always like to pay attention to the details of each client’s home, in particular, newly-built homes. This is because more often than not, the home-owners have selected the colour schemes and textural patterns themselves.

For example, a very contemporary style house with contemporary style furniture tells me that my clients will love the contemporary/modern landscaping ideas for their backyard.

Essentially bringing what they have inside their home to the outside is ideal. Why? Two reasons: one, because it’s a style I know they will love. Two, because the outside of the house should flow with the inside of the house as well. This will make it a much more beautiful, comprehensive landscape design.

Tip #5: Seek advice from a Calgary backyard landscaping professional.

When coming up with landscaping ideas for backyards, you can certainly try to sketch up what you are thinking. Alternatively, as most people end up doing, you can check out inspirational landscaping company websites, like Houzz for ideas.

This is alright to do as a secondary resource, but I often tell my clients to keep one thing in mind: every yard is different.

Every home-owner needs custom planning as it relates to their particular yard. The grades, the size, and sun and wind exposure all differ within just one quadrant in Calgary.

Hence, hiring a professional landscape design company in Calgary that has a trained landscape designer can add real value.

Often, home-owners will go through the flyers they get in the mail and call 3-5 landscaping companies asking for a “quote” or “estimate.” What you have to realize, however, that the money you’re spending on your yard today can make or break the value of your most significant investment: your home.

Thus, seeking professional landscaping consultation from a professional landscaping design company in Calgary will open your eyes to a variety of possibilities that can bolster and accentuate your property.