outdoor herb garden styles and form

Apart from the obvious technical growing aspects of planting your herb garden, another thing to take into consideration is the outward appearance of your garden and how it accentuates any other gardens you may have as well as how it appears in relation to your house. You will most likely want your garden to attractively accentuate the characteristics of the surrounding features of the landscape and buildings.

 

There are a wide variety of books, magazines, and television programs that can provide you with ideas and inspiration that may help to give you a vision of what you need.  You can also rely on your own inner vision and intuition for artistically creative ideas if you consider yourself to be of an artistic mind.

 

Styles

 

There are two main styles of outdoor herb gardens to keep in mind when you are planning the overall design of your herb garden.  There is the ever popular geometric goodness that is the formal herb garden to consider.  The other style is called informal and as the name implies it has less of a defined structure and lends a more organic feel to its surroundings.

 

Formal

 

A small word of warning, formal herb gardens are the most difficult, expensive, and time consuming of all garden styles.  They require a huge amount of work to design, build, and maintain. If you don’t have the time, energy, patience, or money to spend, then you should definitely consider another much simpler garden design.  If, on the other hand, you do have plenty of spare time, resources, and a passion for gardening then this may be the garden look for you. 

 

Formal herb gardens are clearly defined by straight lines and clearly distinct geometric patterns that can be meticulously framed with inlaid paths as well as rows of short hedges.  Another characteristic of formal herb gardens is the obvious use of a centralized point of reference such as a fountain or bench.  The entire design of the garden is then specifically arranged around the innermost axis of the primary point of interest.

 

Informal

 

For those who are wanting a beautiful yet simple herb garden that is easily and affordably  designed, built, and maintained the informal style herb garden is the perfect choice.   The graceful organic flow of the informal style garden design allows for the planting of rounded plant beds and pathways that curve in a much more natural fashion that can really help to add some positive feng shui energy to your environment.

 

You can truly enhance the look of such a garden with the addition of a few other simple things such as shrubs, and flowers.  The informal style garden design really lends itself well to the potential for creativity and imagination.  Let your greatest garden visions be realized by expressing yourself in this truly simplistic gardening style and create your own herbal garden paradise.