i88 



LANDSCAPE DESIGN 



Planting as 

 Decoration of 

 Structure 



entirely surrounded by small planting, but with the ordinary dwelling- 

 house it is usually a mistake completely to surround its base with an 

 indiscriminate garniture of shrubbery. 



Planting may be used purely for the decoration of the facade of a 

 building, as, for instance, where vine-covered lattices of definite shapes 

 are used as a part of its architectural design. To some extent this is the 

 effect of specimen evergreens placed close to the building on each side 

 of an entrance. Formal rows of evergreens or architecturally-clipped 

 plants may be set out in the ground or placed in tubs and may, at least 

 in certain views, serve as a paneling and decoration of the lower part of a 

 building fagade. Similarly, vines or flowering plants in window-boxes 

 may add a note of color or an area of green to the architectural com- 

 position ; or vines may actually be grown over the surface of the build- 

 ing, perhaps to relieve some harshness of form, perhaps to give panels of 

 green, perhaps even completely to change the texture of the building 

 to that created by the leafage of the vine, and to throw a charitable 

 mantle of vegetation over a multitude of architectural sins. 



It is to be noticed that the texture of the leafage of any vine is 

 more diffuse and weak than the texture of any material used in archi- 

 tectural construction, and that therefore if this vine-texture is to cover 

 considerable areas of a house or of a wall, these vine-covered areas would 

 better be wall rather than post, curtain rather than pavilion. That is, 

 the areas which are less important, less functional architecturally, as it 

 were, should be given the softer texture. (See again Drawing VI.) 

 Another decoration of architectural fagade by planting which is well 

 worthy of the designer's serious attention is the falling of the shadows of 

 trees on the sides of a building. An otherwise monotonous expanse 

 may be redeemed by the shadow tracery of winter branches or the 

 dappling of summer shade ; the main entrance of a building may be 

 made more important by the shadows of two trees which subdue the 

 walls on each side of it. 



