No matter what time of year you want your outdoor space to be bursting with seasonal colors.
At Clean Peak Landscaping, we love working with homeowners to transform their landscapes by incorporating all kinds of native plants and seasonal flowers that thrive in our local West Chester climate. If you’re looking to add color to your home this season, keep reading to learn how you can boost your curb appeal and create a beautiful landscape year-round.
Understanding the Local Climate and Soil
Before you start picking out plants for your yard, it’s important to understand the specific traits of the Chester County climate and soil. This can help ensure you pick the right plants that will thrive in your yard.
Climate Considerations
Chester County experiences a pretty temperate climate with four distinct seasons. While summers are warm and humid, winters can be cold and snowy. Luckily, our springs and fall are usually mild and give us great conditions for planting. When you’re picking out plants, make sure to think about how hardy they are and if they survive through the local weather patterns.
Soil Types
In Chester County, the soil can vary from sandy to clay-like, depending on your specific property. To find out what your soil is like and how acidic or alkaline it is, you can do a soil test. This can ensure you know what’s going on below the surface to pick the best plants. Most plants prefer a type of soil that drains well and has a neutral pH. If your soil is too acidic or too alkaline, you might need to make some changes to help your plants grow better.
Choosing the right plants to add color
Choosing the right plants is really important when you want to create a beautiful and healthy outdoor space. In Chester County, there are lots of flowers and plants that grow naturally or do well in the area, and they can give you lots of different seasonal color plantings to make your garden look nice all year round.
Here are six plants that are well-suited to the local Chester County environment for bursts of seasonal colors:
- Black-eyed Susan: These hardy perennials produce bright yellow flowers with dark centers, adding a jolt of brightness to your flower bed. They bloom from mid-summer to early fall and are known for their strength and hardiness.
- Eastern Redbud – Eastern Redbuds are small, deciduous trees that produce vibrant pink or purple flowers in early spring. Since they’re native to the eastern part of the country, they’re a great addition to your outdoor living space.
- Coneflower – With daisy-like blooms in shades of pink, purple, and white, these flowers can survive with little water and bloom from summer to fall. They bring pollinators, too, like bees and butterflies, which are great for your other flowers.
- Butterfly Weed – This beautiful perennial is a local favorite, gracing our area with vibrant clusters of bright orange blooms from late spring to early fall.
- Virginia Bluebells – These early spring bloomers produce clusters of blue, bell-shaped flowers, making them a great seasonal color flowers. They grow great in moist, well-drained soil.
- Switchgrass – Switchgrass is a native ornamental grass that adds texture and movement to your landscape. In the late summer, it grows into small, pinkish flower clusters.
Chester County landscape design for added curb appeal
Creating a visually appealing landscape involves more than just selecting colorful plants. Here are some design tips to help you arrange your plants for maximum impact:
Color Blocking
Color blocking is a seasonal landscaping technique that focuses on grouping plants with similar colors together for bold colorful gardens. This technique creates an eye catching display and adds some nice structure to your landscape when all the colors are grouped together.
Layering for Depth
Layering your garden is when you add texture and dimension to your garden by mixing plants of different heights and styles. Start with taller plants in the back, medium-height ones in the middle, and low-growing plants up front. This setup creates a nice flow and makes your landscape pop!
Complementary Colors
Using complementary colors can really create a harmonious and balanced look. These colors are opposite each other on the color wheel, like blue and orange or purple and yellow. Pairing them together can make your plants stand out in your garden and boost the curb appeal of your landscape.
Tips for keeping your garden colorful
If all this sounds great but you’re wondering how you can keep up with a colorful garden, our team is here to help. As trusted landscapers in Chester County, our seasonal planting services can help you maintain your garden every season, ensuring you always have a beautiful outdoor space for your home or commercial property.
Here are some basics to keep your yard colorful this year:
- Watering – Taking good care of your plants by watering them regularly is a key part of keeping them blooming. It’s best to water them thoroughly, but not too often, so that their roots grow nice and strong. Make sure to pay attention to each plant’s specific water needs, because giving them too much or too little water can make them unhappy and unhealthy.
- Fertilizing- Kind of like taking your vitamins every day, adding fertilizer to your garden can help your plants grow and bloom. You can use a balanced fertilizer or organic options like compost or manure to make the soil healthier and provide nutrients to the plants over time.
- Pruning – Pruning involves cutting away dead or sick parts of the plant to encourage new growth and more flowers. Make sure to use clean, sharp tools and learn the right technique to prune different types of plants.
Add color to your property with the help of Clean Peak Landscaping
Book a consultation with one of our expert landscape designers at Clean Peak Landscaping. We can’t wait to help you!