2025 Priority 3: Expand the Island Bed - Front Yard - March 2025

My list of potential projects is now posted and includes a couple that I've already posted about and one this one - that I'm going to call number three for the year.   My 'early look' list is here.  Priority 1 - the renovation of the bluestone chip gravel garden path is here.  And, Priority 2 - the minimum viable product on the pizza oven project is here.  

My third project is in the front yard - the island bed.  

I created this bed in mid-Summer 2024 when I planted the Korean Maple (Northern Glow) and cut out a kidney-bean-shaped bed in the 'front-ish' of our front yard.  Kind-of in the corner between our sidewalk and driveway.  I added a Spring Grove dwarf Ginkgo tree next to the Korean Maple a couple days later.  I also planted some Inferno coleus as an annual and an October Daphne sedum (that the rabbits ate up all Summer...). 

In the Fall, I added even more to this bed - three dwarf Seslarias (John Greenlee), six (6) Ajuga Chocolate Chip plugs late in the season (not sure if these made it through the Winter) and finally (also in Fall Planting season), I extended the bed *backwards* (towards the house) and added a small Skylands Spruce tree.  

Here's what this island bed looks like right now - in the middle of late-winter dormancy below.   You can see the space between the driveway and sidewalk and this bed.  Hence...the name:  "island bed".

Last year, I posted a couple of posts about front yard conifer gardens and talked about them as inspiration.  Here's one that includes some reference photos of a couple spectacular front yard gardens.  Here's a post showing a mix of upright conifers and some purple, perennial Stachys Hummelos that I've come back to over-and-over. 

And, just over a year ago - when there was still frost on the ground - I created this post showing the potential for planting in a manner that might allow for miegakure (Hide and Reveal).  

When I started down this process of planting the front yard, I didn't start with the idea of an ISLAND.  I wanted a bed that actually touched both the driveway and the sidewalk.  As a starting point.  But, I also knew that I wasn't sure I would have all of the plant material to FILL UP THE WHOLE SPACE.  

This is, after all, our FRONT YARD.  So, it couldn't look totally unfinished for a whole season.  

In this post, I called it "finding a Phase 1".  

Phase 1 was the island bed.  

But this year, I'm ready to expand it.  

Taking that same photo at the top of this post and annotating it (below) with two things:  A potential new edge around the perimeter and dimensions.  From the corner, the far-edges of the Island Bed are about twelve-feet-square. Twelve feet up the driveway.  Twelve feet down the sidewalk.  See below:

I've talked about extending beds the 'lazy way' - using cardboard to smother out the turf grass.  All it requires is a layer of cardboard, some municipal biosolids, compost and other organic material to mix in with the biosolids, a layer of mulch and...finally....time.  Time to allow the grass to die-off.  Time for the biosolids and organic material to break-down a little bit and mellow-out.  

Being Mid-March, I'm running out of TIME.

So, that means, step one of this project is to get going on the 'lazy' extensions. 

If I get the bed created now, I can plant it by May. 

But, what might that planting look like?  

I go back to a few things:

First, this inspiration photo featuring a mixed evergreen front yard.  

Then, I think about what I've learned over the years and what I'm drawn-to in good gardens.

First, what I've learned and drawn-to:

• Coleus as a bedding plant works great up there.  
• The Autumn Moor Grasses that I planted last Summer are the standouts in our front porch bed.  And they have a low-height.
• Groundcover - via sedges and/or Ajuga is important.
• And, there are key considerations when it comes to legibility in the garden.
• Mass plantings with limited number of species/varieties
• Mixed evergreens
• Grasses

That limited pallet of varieties and species means limiting what I put here to things that I already have and things that work.  What could that list look like?

Autumn Moor Grasses

Stachys Hummellos
Coleus as Annual

Mixed conifers/evergreen shrubs
Groundcover - either sedges or ajuga

Back to that 12x12 image.  Know what else is 12' long?  

The part of the front porch bed where I have eight Autumn Moor grasses.  

Here's a current look at that bed with eight grass crowns:

8 Autumn Moor Grasses (Seslaria Autumnalis) in 12-foot Bed

They're also *low* and can be planted mid-bed.  This post shows they're "lower" than the Summer Beauty Alliums.  

What other inspiration photos have I collected over the years?  Let's start with this one below.  It is from this post of front yard landscape inspiration photos.  What jumps out to me are the Blue Fescue grasses - planted in mass - with contrasting color shrubs and textures.

What about the Autumn Moor Grasses as that 'mass planting'.  12x12 means (potentially) eight on either side of the middle:

And contrasting it with either coleus as an annual and/or something like Stachys Hummello - in pink circles below:

And, then....what about bringing some formality to the bed - with a low boxwood hedge.  All the way around.  Like what I posted about here.  See below for the green circle hedge planted all the way around.

And, finally...tucking in groundcover up front - Ajugas and/or sedges - in orange:

This bed would call for:

15-16 Autumn Moor Grasses

A couple trays of groundcover

6 or 7 coleus or Stachys

And A LOT of small boxwoods.  I have them spaced two-feet-on-center under the Lindens and that's probably too-far apart.  Call it 16 small boxwoods. 

That would be a big job and a significant change to the front yard.  

It pays off on:  mass planting, using evergreens, and not introducing new varieties.

What needs to be sorted is the Skylands Spruce and if it stays or goes.  

Option two would be similar, but use a different inspo photo from same post.    Showing it below - this uses a mix of boxwoods (upright vs sphere) in different shapes with mixed texture perennials in front.  

This, too, requires a decision on the Skylands Spruce.  Say we leave it.  Along with the Spring Grove Ginkgo.  And Northern Glow Korean Maple.  And execute a staggered, mixed boxwoods cluster on the driveway side only.  

Or, partially around.  What could that look like?  Probably less Autumn Moor Grasses (green) and more, larger, upright boxwoods (white) with some other mixed evergreens in purple.  

Does that Skylands stay?  Do the boxwoods go *behind* it?  Below shows the Skylands in blue - which gets to 10' in width after ten years.  We're A LONG WAY from that.

 

I'll keep noodling the right mix, but a few things are certain:  Extending the bed SOON is job one.