In building a house, one would not think of buying a heterogeneous lot of 

 building material just because he liked it; rather would he carefully buy the 

 material called for in some predetermined plan. Furthermore, by far the greatest 

 part of such material must go into the walls, the floors, and the body of the 

 structure. The decorative features of the house are in a very small proportion 

 to the rest of the house, and are determined as to their position and character 

 In the course of the general planning. Therefore they are essentially a part of the 

 prearranged plan. But it is ridiculous to attempt to plan the decorative details 

 before the structure to which they must be related is designed, as they are the 

 last part of the house to be planned in detail and built. The application of this 

 principle to the yard is quite as necessary as is its application to the house. The 

 border plantations, the hedges or the plantations between the several areas, the 

 trees or the shrubs which frame the house front, and the turf which carpets most 

 of the ground, collectively, make up the structure of the yard. While the plan for 

 the yard is being formulated, gateways, arbors, pools, fountains, seats, and even 

 picturesque groups or special color effects of plants, may suggest themselves or 

 appear necessary in one place or another. In fact, their effectiveness or useful- 

 ness in particular positions may even suggest their exact details; but these con- 

 stitute so small a proportion of the material or of the area of the yard, that they 

 should be the last steps in the planning or the making of the yard. The structure 

 of the yard must first exist before it can possibly be decorated, and general plans 

 must first be formulated before one can have the point of view essential for the 

 consideration of details or of decoration. Thus, planting plans must primarily 

 concern the enclosing plantations, the hedges, the mass planting, and even the 

 arrangement of the lawn area. The importance of the structural planting lies 

 not only in its conversion of a portion of unlimited area into the limited area of 

 a yard and its specific areas, providing privacy and protection, but also in its 

 effective massing of the vegetation, which is essential to the beauty of the yard 

 and as an effective background for the house, the decorative structures, and even 

 the decorative plants. 



The open lawn is the foreground of the house front; the flanking trees or shrubs 

 grouped about it furnish its frame; and the plants at the door accentuate its 

 entrance without attracting attention to themselves. If the green of the trees is 

 of a tone that harmonizes with the green of the grass and of the shrubbery, then 

 the planting in the front yard, collectively, serves as a frame and a foreground to 

 the house front, the plants at the door perhaps being slightly more noticeable. 

 Essential as all this planting is, however, it is unquestionably subservient to the 

 house. In comparatively small yards, large shade trees make for a better appear- 

 ance if they are of a common species, such as elm, maple, the spreading type of 

 oak or the like, because they are unobtrusive. Trim hedges of uniform density and 

 perfection of surface set off most effectively the beautiful form or color of the 

 flowers or fruits of nearby decorative plants. A perfect lawn is likewise essential 

 to the display of an occasional fine specimen tree or shrub that, while not planted 

 in the center of the lawn, may still be somewhat detached from the boundary 

 plantations. The use of the grass of the lawns, yards, and gardens corresponds 

 closely to that of the plain floor coverings inside the house; and the less patchy 

 and the more evenly fine its texture, the more satisfactory the background it 

 furnishes for those things disposed upon it. 



