Add Outdoor Features

While a landscaping budget may be focused primarily on the big things—grading, irrigation and large plantings—sometimes it’s the finishing touches that make the biggest impact on clients and their guests. Ornamental accessories, such as fountains, statuary, decorative outside furniture and even artful flower pots, add visual interest and personality to any yard plan, but knowing what to pick and where to put it takes some thought.

Year-round Interest
Eye-catching hardscape elements serve an important purpose in landscape planning, designers say. Such additions give eyes a place to rest and add structure to a garden even when plants aren’t around.

“They provide a sustained interest—they’re always there in all four seasons,” says Judith Adam, a Toronto-based landscape designer and horticulturist, and author of Landscape Planning. She adds that the practice of incorporating man-made decoration also marks the place where something is placed as something a little special, and emphasizes the fact that the garden is the result of a plan, not simply a random occurrence.

“It usually helps give a place a sense of identification,” Adam says. “And most often it says that this is a place where people are. The important thing is, you want it to be seen as often as possible—sometimes you can even frame it in a window view.”

Other professionals agree that looking at the prospective placement from all angles is an important part of the design process.

“I always try to think, ‘Where are they going to be looking at it from,’” says Tom Dahlmeir, a landscape designer with Southview Design in Inver Grove Heights, Minn. “You’ve got to make sure you’re going to get a good view.”

Narrow the Options
Choosing just the right kind of object to fit the chosen spot requires professionals to spend some time understanding their clients’ style preferences. Dahlmeir gets some cues from a home’s interior furnishings—he says the garden elements can help reinforce interior design decisions. So a traditionally decorated home might lead him to suggest a classically styled urn, while Asian prints might lead him to a Japanese-lantern sculpture.

Adam also takes note of her clients’ personalities. So, for example, she suggests that a particularly practical homeowner might be happier with something more functional, like a stone bench, while a more artistic-leaning client might find something sculptural more appealing.

“It has a lot to do with the client’s temperament,” she says. “It helps a lot to look at their house first—that will help you make some suggestions. If you don’t see any artwork on the walls, then you probably want something very functional. If they seem to be very relaxed and have a woodland garden, perhaps you could suggest an ornamental birdhouse.”

Size is Everything
Size is also an important factor to consider, especially because the objects you choose may be viewed most often from a distance.

Experts have various strategies for ensuring decorative elements have the desired impact.

“When you’re picking that piece, you have to figure out what scale it should be,” Dahlmeir says. He says he often positions the client at the chosen vantage point and then stands, himself, at the installation point with a tape measure to allow the homeowner to choose between various size options.

Adam says she prefers objects that are slightly larger than life. She shares a simple rule of thumb for determining just how big is big enough.

“Decide what you think would be a normal size, and then go up one,” she says. “It should appear slightly overscale so it attracts more attention. If it’s too small in the setting, it gets trivialized.”

Lightweight, But Not Light on Style
Certainly the product options are wider than ever today, with new material advances enabling fiberglass and composite options that can be as attractive as cast concrete or iron at a fraction of the weight, maintenance and cost.

“You can move them so easily,” Dahlmeir says, noting that this portability also can lead to cost-savings, since contractors or their clients can often drive these products home themselves. “You don’t have to have them delivered.”

In addition, he says, products made from these materials generally are less expensive than their traditionally manufactured counterparts. This advantage can be a critical element in clients’ decisions, regardless of their style preferences—a fact landscapers must remember, Dahlmeir says.

“It’s very important to understand the client’s price point,” he adds. “Everything comes back to the dollar. A lot of times, it’s the price that will determine the decision.”