Florida friendly front yard in Julington Creek

Our clients have a beautiful and traditional brick home in Julington Creek! They wanted a classic landscape refresh that could be used in conjunction with their homeschooling program. Just like all living things plants and landscapes have a natural lifespan too! Even with great care, several years of pruning and growing eventually cause plants to grow out the scale intended in the original design. We guided our clients through choosing the best components to keep and then seamlessly incorporating new design components that better suited their family.

This landscape is a classic North Florida evergreen landscape design. The foundation of the design is built around reliable evergreens like dwarf camellias and dwarf podocarpus. We used large upright Simpson stoppers for tall narrow elements that help balance the low growing foundational plants. We then incorporated whimsy with a row of apricot drift roses ending at a unique bush form Rhode Island Red Japanese maple.

This Landscape involves a moderate level of maintenance. We built a large perennial butterfly and cut flower garden around their existing Live Oak. This area was part of their homeschooling curriculum and is maintained by the entire family. Other elements of the landscape are very low maintenance requiring only seasonal pruning. As always we try to pick the right plants for the right spots to limit the maintenance involved.

We experimented with creating visual interest along the front walk by setting the high point of the garden in the middle of the bed instead of the more predictable lowest to highest configuration. We also balanced the use of perennial pollinator friendly gardens with more formal shrubs to maintain cohesiveness with the general community style.