Drawing attention to your garden

By Hosea Omole

Do you want to add a much-valued gazebo, statue, ornamental dÈcor, a birdbath or feeder to your garden design? Are you looking forward to create the best impact on your garden, which will wow every visitor to your house?

A walkway with several stone types made as a focal point.

If you pick your best pieces and place them in the next available spaces, chances are you will not get the impact you had expected.

Key garden elements need to be highlighted and emphasised in the design for maximum impact. Careful thought and consideration should be given to their selection, placement and positioning, otherwise they will tend to look like mere afterthoughts as opposed to highly valued pieces.

Creating this emphasis involves identifying and enhancing focal points in your garden.

Draw the eyes

A focal point is a spot in the landscape design that draws the eyes and then holds the interest. It can be as simple as one spectacular plant or group of plants placed among others in the design.

Floral archway still under construction. Photos: / courtesy

For instance, a tall shrub placed at the centre on a low flowerbed stands out and becomes the centre of attention. The tall shrub must, however, be interesting for it to retain attention.

All gardens need at least one focal point for interest. Larger gardens may have several. Having more than one focal point should, however, be carefully evaluated so that competition for attention does not get out of hand.

Here is how to create a perfect focal point for your perfect pieces.

Colour

Colour is one of the strongest landscape design elements. A dramatic change in colour can attract attention and create a simple and effective focal point.

A red geranium in the midst of a flowerbed made up of white flowers stands out. A single white geranium in the midst of a red dominated bed is even more dramatic since the white colour is an attention seeker in itself.

Scale

Blue stone water fountain at the Bomb blast memorial gardens.

Scale is the relative size between elements in a design. A sudden change in size can create a focal point at the threshold of the change. A large tree in the middle of low shrubs stands out and takes attention. Similarly, a group of low shrubs surrounded by large trees look like the odd ones out (in a good way) and draws attention.

Centrepiece

The human eye has a very strong connection with circular forms. Most of us are able to visually find the centre of a circle and naturally expect to find something interesting there.

Curved paths, beds and walls constitute circles and circle segments, which the eyes naturally recognise even though the circles may not be complete. The centre of these circle segments are, therefore, natural places for focal points.

Creating a focal point is not just about getting a unique centrepiece. It is also a matter of how the other elements are arranged around it.

A spectacular plant landscape design dazzles in as a focal point in a garden.

Placing the piece at the centre of a curve or circle helps it to stand out. Locating elements that flank that centrepiece and direct views to it helps it to stand out further.

Scenery

Besides garden elements, offsite sceneries can make perfect focal points. If you are lucky enough to have a backdrop of a distant mountain, skyline, river or even a desert scene, use it. Frame it and build your landscape around it.

Any elements that obstruct the scene should be avoided. Lines of plants that radiate from the centre of the scene also direct attention to it.

The writer is a landscape architect