Practical Plans for the Home Grounds—x.utn pean, 
Landscape 
Architect 
IX. Foundation Planting for the Suburban Lot 
A good example of overbalanced vegetation due to 
the selection of unsuitable plants 
HE house swallowed up in ever- 
greens is growing to be too com- 
mon a sight in present day plant- 
ing not to call for a protest. 
Nurserymen properly enough suggest to 
the householder that he should have 
planting about his house which will stay 
green all winter, and the prospective 
purchaser seizes upon this 
trees with such interesting habits of 
branching as those possessed by the 
Hawthorn, Dogwood, Black Locust and 
Linden; and to the color group the red 
berried and red and yellow twigged 
shrubs. These deciduous shrubs with 
their graceful spreading branches are 
needed to tie together the definite forms 
and distinct outlines of the evergreens. 
There is nothing quite so stiff and 
bumpy as the collection of evergreen, 
yellow and blue pyramids and balls one 
sees disposed in awkward masses about 
the base of a house, nor anything as 
somber and damp looking as solid banks 
of Rhododendrons ‘‘masking” its foun- 
dation. 
The idea of foundation olan 3 is not 
to “mask” (for there is nothing about 
an honest foundation wall to be con- 
cealed), but to tie the house to its sur- 
roundings, to give it an effect of sitting 
comfortably on its green lawn. 
In order to accomplish this the plant- 
ing must have some semblance of be- 
longing to the country round about, of 
fitting into the landscape, and certainly 
nothing could look more exotic than all 
the little stiff vari-colored evergreens 
and Japanese red maples which con- 
stitute the stock foundation planting. 
But these, bad as they are, have one 
What happens when forest trees are used to 
the corner of the piazza 
“support”’ 
excuse in their dwarf size, which another 
type of evergreen planting lacks. I 
mean the planting which consists of 
such forest trees as those shown in the 
picture to the right. 
It is eagerness for a quick effect or 
else ignorance of the habits and char- 
acter of the trees, which leads most 
people into the incongruity 
as a good idea, and repeats 
it to his friends, until it be- 
comes thoroughly fixed in 
his mind and he is con- 
vinced of its soundness. 
Now, it is perfectly true 
that some bushes which do 
not lose their leaves with | 
the first departing swallow L 
are desirable. But it is just 
as true. that not all the 
planting about a house 
should keep its summer ap- 
pearance all through the 
winter, for this is unnatural 
and artificial and will inev- 
itably look stiff and inar- 
tistic. Moreover, there are 
other colors, such as red 
and yellow, quite as cheer- 
ful in the winter landscape 
as green, and certain trees 
(aS eS 
Ze sil 
2 Wi ea 
res 
GLE, be 
RA Ree COE 
a am 
ENS reg wx 
Cae Bose 
a. 
Hy, 4 
LULTIO 
OMe Fete 
IS i 
and bushes are as attractive 
SIDLWALK - 
of planting huge trees such 
as Douglas Spruce, Hemlock, 
Colorado Blue Spruce, and 
White Pine, around the 
foundations of their houses. 
These trees belong out in 
| the open where they can 
spread their branches and 
stretch their limbs. 
| The other two photographs 
accompany the planting plan 
which shows the foundation 
of a house planted with a 
mixture of two of the lower 
growing evergreens and 
some deciduous shrubs and 
is designed to look well all 
the year round. It is a 
planting not half so costly 
as the others and yet in 
January it presents just as 
pleasing a picture, and five 
years from now it will not 
minus their leaves, as they | 
have overgrown the house 
are covered with foliage. 
To the latter class belong 
erately growing shrubs, etc., 
This planting plan and the two photographs below show an appropriate use of mod- 
which will not bury the house itself 
or died from lack of room to 
expand properly. 
167 
