Photo of the Week Archives

Landscaping is about more than adding some flowers and shrubs to an area. Combine plants, water features, pavers, lights, decorative rock, and other elements to create an extension of your home outdoors. The way you use your outdoor spaces - or wish to use them - determines the design that is custom made for you. Look at Grimm's Gardens web site for many exiting way's to enhance your outdoor living space. Photo courtesy of Grimm's Gardens.

Water gardens are one of the fastest growing trends in landscaping. Water definitely adds a new dimension and atmosphere to your garden and landscape. For more information on water garden see Pontz Landscape Services, Inc. Photo courtesy of Pontz Landscape Services.

Concrete steps add contrast to the soft scapes and adds access to those secluded quiet spots in your garden. Photo courtesy of Two Hands Limited in Watsonville, CA. Look for them at www.two-hands.com

Bjorn Landscapes is a bay area company offering quality hardscapes and maintenance for the discerning customer. Look at their web site for information and help in creating your very own butterfly habitat. Photo courtesy of Bjorn Landscapes visit them at www.bjornlandscapes.com

Stamped stained concrete steps add a natural beauty to your landscape design. Photo courtesy of www.diamonddcompany.com

Lighthouse Outdoor Living specializes in creative outdoor low voltage Landscape Lighting design, installation and service for home or business. Outdoor lighting can be both functional and aesthetic. It's an art to understand how much light to place on a house or determine where the focal points are. See your home in a new light. Visit Light House Landscape Lighting at www.lightsbylighthouse.com. Photo courtesy of Light House Landscape Lighting.

Nature is the ultimate gardener, fall brings a palate of color. Thank you Evo Design for the beautiful photo, see Evo Designs web site at www.evodesign.biz for more inspiring photos of landscape designs. Photo courtesy of Evo Design.

The proper mix of lawn, fencing and ground cover creates a dream come true kids' play area. Photo courtesy David Pettigrew.

Welcome To My Garden, a landscape design firm located in Essex County, New Jersey, can begin to create the garden of your dreams. By following the philosophy "form follows function," they take the environmental needs of your yard and budget and transform it into a garden that fits your lifestyle. Photo courtesy of Welcome to my Garden. Visit them at www.welcometomygarden.net

Hardscape should be timeless, like framing a masterpiece. These planters beckon to be filled with color and texture. Photo by Millennium Landscapes.

This could be the view from your window. Get lost in the sound of water moving over rocks. Photo from Moss Acres web site www.mossacres.com.

A winning combination bar none -- Exceptional environments for great experiences is the philosophy of Bozeman, Montana-based Blanchford Landscape Contractors, Inc. and this high desert estate reflects the both the enhanced and carefully maintainted natural beauty of its surroundings. Here sandstone steps lead to a sunken patio by a manmade pond, just one of the many comfortable and relaxing living spaces in an overall landscape designed to maximize the use of native plantings and indigenous materials. Photo courtesy of www.blanchfordlandscapecontractors.com.

You don't need to live in the mountains to enjoy the relaxing sounds of a waterfall. Creative Construction & Designs can create the look & feel in your back yard.

Rural nirvana -- seeking to enhance the simplicity and tranquility of this New England colonial home's country setting, Warner, NH-based Pellettieri Associates, Inc. incorporates a beautifully-built stonewall into its design for a brick-surfaced back terrace. The Warner, New Hampshire-based design-build firm's website showcases classic stone work, designer pools and full-scale estate landscaping projects for both East and West Coast clients at www.pellettieriassoc.com. Photo courtesy of Pellettieri Associates, Inc.

More elaborate water features can include a water wheel and fish pond.

Montana fireplace – The durability of stainless steel and options of cost-effective custom-finish masonry surround – and/or gas-log conversion add to the appeal of this outdoor fireplace design from Hearth & Home Technologies’ Montana line. The unit is easily adaptable to an add-on to a deck, patio, or built into a complete outdoor living area.  Photo courtesy of Hearth & Home Technologies (www.heatnglo-lifestyle.com)

Oriental styled stairs create gentle slope while adding dramatic angles and exterior lighting.

This substantial concrete brick retaining wall incorporates design details and hues that work to refine and distinguish it. The hedge serves to further soften the look.

Above -- No, it's not snow. Developed by Georgia-based Koch Cellulose, BlueYellow™ literally yields a "roll out and water in" lawn within five weeks of installation. See photo below for photo after five weeks.

The photo above was taken at "Day 35," three days before the first mow. Made up of a sod-quality mix of seed and fertilizer sandwiched inside layers of cellulose, the product, successfully tested by golf course turf professionals, is just being introduced for use by residential landscape contractors. Photos courtesy of BlueYellow™.

Beautiful building blocks -- Block wall systems such as this one (Anchor Highland Stone) by Minnetonka, Minnesota-based Anchor Block Company are quick to install and lend an artisan feel to the retaining walls, pillars and planters of this backyard hardscape. Photo courtesy of Anchor Block Company (www.anchorwall.com)

LandscapeNetwork.com happened upon this one of a kind, obviously artisan designed stone and brick entrance in Santa Cruz County, California. Elegant and whimsical at once, the colors, textures and exaggerated shape almost suggest a fairytale. Photo by Cheryl Boyer-Meeks.

Let it rain -- although at first glance it may look like some kind of "moonshining" activities going on, this large metal container is holding a harvest of rainwater. Collected from the rooftop, the yield will help feed the homeowner's hungry landscape. Read our "Spotlight On...Irrigation" story on how you, too can make a rainy day pay. Photo courtesy of Blue Ridge Atlantic Engineering (www.braewater.com)

Outdoor 'living it up' -- As the trend towards "hiving," aka spending more time in the backyard with family and friends continues to build, more people are combining all the popular 'bells and whistles' such as large, extended patios for entertaining, outdoor kitchens, and eye-catching water elements that also serve to provide soothing background sound. Photo courtesy of Gardelle Landscape and Design.

Poolside lighting can serve many purposes including providing dramatic outdoor effects and night time safety. Photo courtesy Lighthouse Landscape Lighting.

Play or be a "patio potato" while you watch the kids frolic. Minnesota-based Anchor Block Company's hardscape sytems help landscape contractors quickly build attractive, creative and cost-efficient designs by the block. Photo courtesy of Anchor Block Company (www.anchorwall.com).

Eye-catching design details, like this wooden trellis, built by Concord, CA-based Gardelle Landscaping, are big on charm and also serve to distinguish between two different levels of landscaped areas. Photo courtesy of Gardelle Landscaping (www.gardelle.com).

If your landscape dream is a tropical paradise in your own backyard, companies like Boca Raton-based Botanical Visions, who consider such creations an area of specialty, can design you a beautiful, sustainable natural haven that literally comes alive. Their approach, developing plant lists to include specific non-invasive exotic/ tropical plants and Florida native species, yields an appealing blend of colors and textures that also work to attract wildlife such as hummingbirds, wild birds and butterflies to your new oasis. Photo courtesy of Botanical Visions (www.botanicalvisions.com).

It's that time of the year to be thinking about color and relaxing ponds. Photo courtesy Liberty Landscapes, Inc. (www.libertylandscapers.com)

An illuminating statement -- a well-designed, low-voltage lighting system does much more than provide exterior lighting for safety and security, it creates a dramatic setting that perfectly complements your home's architectural style and setting, as shown in this recent installation by Lighthouse Landscape Lighting.

Serene and subtly reflecting seasonal color and textural changes, this Seattle-based Allworth Nussbaum residential courtyard creates a haven for quiet contemplation. Complementing its modern dwelling, hard and soft scapes are influenced by Japanese and northwest landscapes. Rock placements create a natural sculptural element that quietly exude a feeling of timelessness. Photo courtesy of www.allworthnussbaum.com.

Optimize outdoor living space in a narrow backyard with an inviting patio garden, such as this one designed by Washington, DC-based William Morrow Garden Design www.morrowgardendesign.com. An attractive custom limestone retaining wall and planters were designed with ledges at seating level to maximize gathering potential. Patio stone, hand-selected at a nearby quarry echoes the earthy and green tones adding a natural flair. Photo courtesy of William Morrow Garden Design.

A private patio niche such as this one designed by Goshen, Indiana-based New Vistas Landscaping (www.newvistas.net) is a haven for the senses. Welcoming and relaxing, the space combines comfortable seating within an artful arrangement of all season plantings and hardscape textures. Photo courtesy of New Vistas Landscaping.

Grab an iced tea and come join us on the steps...the Rockwellian image of a front porch and flowers comes to life with a striking profusion of seasonal blooms amid the comely planting beds, designed by St. Louis, MO-based Dunn Lawn & Land (www.dunnlawnandland.com)

Curb appeal -- settled-looking, inviting and altogether charming, Boise, Idaho-based Franz Witte Landscape Contracting achieved this combines a complementary selection of more mature plantings in a way that seems to beckon visitors to the front door. Photo courtesy of Franz Witte Landscape Contracting (www.franzwitte.com).

Besides the natural flair of a flagstone retaining wall surrounding a well-mulched woodlands patio, Birmingham, Alabama-based Naturescape.com, made sure to design this pleasant backyard multi-level retreat to create a functional and aesthetic synergy between the various activity and planted areas. Photo courtesy of www.naturescape.com

Dreaming of your own blue lagoon? Corona, CA-based Creative Construction & Designs specializes in unique pool and spas that place your back door within a few steps of your own tropical paradise. Photo courtesy of Creative Construction & Designs.

Another approach altogether -- Creative Landscaping, a Chandler, IN-based full service company, brings together intriguing design elements and effective execution to make this plan for this trellis-based design walkway to an alternative entrance, well, entrancing. Visual aesthetics and interest counter-balance function for a beautifully resulting side entry and yard. Photo courtesy of Creative Landscaping.

Getting better all the time -- Feel the quiet power of a serene healing garden, such as this design by Somerville, MA-based Weinmayr Associates. The company applies principles of self-hypnotism and meditation to create spaces for socializing and reflection that relax, awaken and engage the senses through the selection of plant matter, construction materials, sculptural and water elements. Photo courtesy of Weinmayr Associates (www.weinmayrassociates.com).

As cozy as the great outdoors -- Houston, Texas-based Garden Dreams designed this stylish, palm-shaded outdoor living room for comfortable socializing and quiet tete-a-tetes. The firm also sells large pots in a myriad of intriguing styles, colors and sizes, providing both eye-catching artistic details to the landscape -- and even more planting space. Photo courtesy of Garden Dreams (www.texasgardendreams.com).

Concord, Ca. based Gardelle Construction and Landscape Inc. is happy to provide high quality and reasonably priced landscaping services. They can handle any project, from periodic maintenance to major landscaping and planting for both residential and commercial properties. Adding a new spa or the beautiful sound of falling water to your home will be a delightful experience and complete the overall look of your home and garden. Gardelle's main objective is to offer quality workmanship and exceptional service at a competitive price, time and time again. Photo Courtesy of Gardelle Construction and Landscape, Inc. www.gardelle.com

Distinctively attractive and inviting (not to mention functional and low-maintenence), this lake home landscape by Birchfield Nurseries includes a central patch of lawn surrounded by fieldstone rip rap, shredded bark, treated tie steps, lawn and retaining wall block. The Rhinelander, Wisconsin-based company also specializes in growing high-quality Northern-climate plant materials, incorporating many of them in the landscapes it creates for its clients across the northern part of the state. Photo courtesy of Birchfield Nurseries, Inc. (www.birchfieldnurseries.com).

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