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Don’s Landscaping Tips: Adding interest to a Brick Wall Imagine looking out of the feature windows in your house and not being able to see anything, except a boring brick wall! Many people are actually finding themselves in this situation these days, because...
Don’s Landscaping Tips: Good Geometry The use of good geometry in garden design creates a spectacular formal courtyard in a small area. Matching the pinky-grey brick of the house with limestone pavers can give a natural looking backdrop for geometrically placed...
Don’s Landscaping Tips: Homeworld Hedges Even if you’re not thinking about building a house, display homes are great places to go and look for ideas. This applies to the outside of the property as well as the inside, as Don found when he visited Homeworld...
Don’s Landscaping Tips: Outdoor Entertainment Area For many years pergolas have been fashionable in Australian backyards, either freestanding or attached to the back of the house. In theory if you plant deciduous climbers they’ll grow over your pergola and...
All too often backyards have a boring sameness about them, but recently Don visited a garden which dares to be different. When designer John Happ first saw the house, he knew that it was important to choose a paving colour to complement the strong, mottled orange...
The use of purple foliage in the garden is one of the more difficult things to get right. But it can be a breath of fresh air from the straight green gardens and the key to using purple is to plant more of it. If you only plant one Berberis or Purple Japanese maple in...
Don’s Landscaping Tips: Window View Windows are essential in houses to let in light and fresh air. But a problem that is common to old and new houses is when a window looks straight out onto a fence or straight onto the neighbour’s house. What do you do to...
Formal Domestic Design The owners of this property did not want deciduous trees dropping leaves, and they didn’t want to spend a lot of time sweeping. Instead they chose a garden in the modern formal style, which makes good use of a number of elements: hedges,...
Global Garden A few years ago theme gardens were very fashionable in Australia. They included cottage gardens, native gardens, succulent gardens, perfumed gardens, white gardens, and more recently, ethnic styles such as Mexican or Tuscan. The latest trend is a blend...
Heather Cant’s Garden Revisit Burke’s Backyard first filmed “Gowan Brae” at Burradoo over four years ago, so we decided it was time to pay Heather Cant another visit. The property is 11/2 acres (0.6ha), and consists of a charming old turn of...