Landscape Design | Julie Moir Messervy Design Studio

Case Study: Front & Back Yard

Sometimes when something is so close to home, it’s hard to step back far enough to see the big picture. That’s where HOD comes in. As a graphic designer and an avid gardener who is married to an architect, Janet doesn’t sound like the type of person who needs help designing her yard.

But with a new garage being built (left) and the former garage turned into a home office, her property needed a fresh, creative makeover. Her backyard, with its large trees and lawn, has two terraces (one that is connected to the house), and many beautiful garden planters and urns. The front yard is fragmented and doesn’t show off her style to the public.

Janet’s profile revealed that she is looking for a garden that has clean, modern lines, connects the inside to the outside, is layered so that there are surprises as one moves through it, and honors the views. She asked JMMDS’s designers to explore a host of different ideas and chose an expanded HOD Plan so that she could have six designs to dream about.

The Schemes:

Classic Formal: a cleanly organized garden with distinct internal focal points to showcase garden objects and planters. A simple pergola at the end of the yard layers the view and gives privacy to the terrace.
French Parterre: a garden derived from the Special Landscapes section in the workbook, in which a landscape was described that she had a profound reaction to.
Patterns: playful and eccentric; stone paths and garden beds are combined into brushstrokes on the ground plane and movement is through the negative space formed by this pattern.
Crisp Angles: explores perspective and direct paths in a clean and distinctive way.
Playful Circles: negative and positive space is explored through a series of overlapping and intersecting circles. Varying plant heights and intersecting paths create this playful and imaginative garden.
Minimalist Bands: orthogonal organization with contrasting lush perennial borders and planes of monocultures layer this garden. Tree-lined walks and simple focal points add interest and surprise.