Landscape makeovers - landscape gardening ideas - Cover Story

Flower & Garden Magazine, April-May, 1993 by Marty Ross

A 6-foot brick wall in front separates the property from a neighbor's driveway and makes the entrance a private court. At the back entrance, which the family uses regularly, a wall was built to create another courtyard. Rhododendrons and astilbe bloom within the walls.

In the front, a fluffy border of liriope, rich mounds of hosta and low, unpruned boxwood soften the edges of the brick home. The palette is decidedly woodsy. Dogwoods and crape myrtles were planted in the understory of the existing trees on the lot.

Scully believes that special plants are worth waiting for, and when the right specimen of magnolia was found, she had a plan for it. The tree is being trained as an espalier against the house. The effect, Scully says, is as though the woods just came up and rang the doorbell.