How to Landscape a Small Garden

The joy of gardening is that you can create landscapes for both large and small spaces. When landscaping a small space, you should think in terms of style, scale, form, color, repetition and fragrance. These factors help you focus garden ideas on plants and flowers that will maximize the limited space available for your landscape. Soil type, region, local weather conditions and the amount of time you can spare will also guide you in this task.

Things You'll Need
Pencil and paper
Small plants and trees
A few taller trees or bushes

Instructions

1. Draw a diagram of your landscape space. This allows you to create a plan for your garden prior to spending money on plants.

2. Choose smaller versions of larger plants. Many smaller varieties exist of plants or trees. These allow you to add more plants for size and color than selecting a few large plants or trees.

3. Pick a focal point for the garden area. For example, a small walkway, garden bench or water fountain may be the focal point, with flowers, shrubs and trees surrounding this feature.

4. Plant taller trees or bushes to provide a natural shade barrier for smaller plants. This shade helps protect plants that have a low tolerance to sunlight.

5. Create an unusual design for your landscape space. Avoid straight lines, needless repetition or planting shrubs in order from shortest to tallest.

Tips & Warnings

When landscaping a small garden space, think in terms of what the plant will look like at maturity. While plants look nice small, they may eventually grow too big for the garden.

Design the garden how you want, not what a book tells you to do. Creating a sense of individuality will give your garden a special look that can match your personality.

Source: http://www.ehow.com/how_8200400_landscape-small-garden.html

Small Garden Landscaping Ideas

Gardening is one of the most popular pastimes in the United States. Every day, you'll find people puttering in their yards, creating colorful scenery surrounding their homes. However, if you have limited space, coming up with small garden landscaping ideas may feel daunting. Landscaping a small garden need not be complex to turn out beautifully.

Borders
Put a border around your garden. This gives it a more formal feel. Even if the garden itself isn't planned, the border creates a simple and easy landscape feature. Use stone, small evergreens or ground cover perennials that you can train into the desired shape. One suggestion for planting is English thyme. It makes a nice low-level ground cover.

Theme Gardens
Come up with a theme for your garden before you plant. Have a garden featuring mainly plants with yellow flowers or leaves, for example. Other theme ideas include a butterfly garden, a knot garden and an herb garden. None of these require much space, but it's a good idea to plan them out on paper first so the garden goes in correctly the first time.

Edible Landscapes
Small gardens make a perfect location for edible landscaping. Many herbs and vegetables do quite well in smaller gardens. Know your soil and pick items that you enjoy eating fresh. Start with a tomato plant in the center of your garden. Surround it with garlic and onion plants in a circular pattern. Pant basil and oregano at the garden's edge.

Rocks, Statuary and Water Features
Add water features, statuary or rocks to your garden. Get small water features at numerous home and garden shops that aren't difficult to assemble and use. Pattern your other garden plants around that feature to give it the feel desired. Statuary and rocks work well. Rock gardens are ideal for small spaces, and statuary comes in all sizes and shapes.

Source: http://www.ehow.com/list_6576160_small-garden-landscaping-ideas.html