The French Garden (or formal garden)
A formal garden or French garden is a neat and ordered garden
laid out in carefully planned geometric and symmetric lines. Lawns and
hedges in a formal garden must always be kept neatly clipped. Trees, shrubs, subshrubs and other foliage is carefully arranged, shaped and continually trimmed.
The simplest formal garden would be a box-trimmed hedge lining or enclosing a carefully laid out flowerbed or garden bed, such as a knot garden. The most elaborate formal gardens contain pathways, statuary, fountains and beds on differing levels. Try incorperating some of these items in your French Garden:
- Arbors, trellises, window boxes and simple arches defined by healthy
plant growth are ideal symbols of the French country garden.
- Wrought iron chairs painted white along with a matching table can be placed anywhere in the landscape.
- A small pathway may open up to a garden pond with a water feature or rustic wooden bridge.
- When choosing your plantings, consider a wealth of green foliage plants in varying shapes and sizes.
- By incorporating old-world features such as statues or urns filled with luxuriant plant growth, you can adapt any landscape into a French vision of beauty.
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 Cottage Style
While
formal gardens thrive on order and well-defined spaces, cottage gardens
bubble in cheerful tangles of flowers that form a kaleidoscope of hue
and texture. Cottage garden style is
relaxed, colorful, and low maintenance. Here are some tips for creating a cottage garden:
- Start Small-Don't create a monster that you
don't have time to feed and weed. Keep your cottage
garden small, and most of all, fun. Over time you can increase the size.
- Invest in Good Soil-Starting with good, rich, organic
soil where plants will thrive with a minimum of watering and
fertilizing cuts the work from the start
- Position Plants Carefully-Much work in a garden comes from not having the right plant in the right place.
- Select Sturdy Beauties-Choose high-performance, almost
bulletproof plants. There is no right way or
wrong way to create a cottage garden, so choose what you love.
- Cover Soil-"Mulching helps maintain soil moisture levels and prevents weeds from growing.
- Make it automatic-when it comes to watering trade dragging a hose around for
hands-free watering. Use a "drip hose", as it's easy to put the water
exactly where you want it - on the soil and not on the foliage or flowers. (taken from BH&G Garden Tips)
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What's In-Store:
- Currently under development is my new store website with shopping cart capabilities. Soon you will be able to shop on-line as well as visit the store. Look for this mid June/2008. You can check on-line at : www.frenchvanillahome.com
- Paris Flea-Market Side Walk Salel" - Can't get to Paris this summer for the real thing then visiting us on Saturday June 14th is the next best thing. Come shop for savings up to 50% off on selected items.......and one more thing ..... bartering is encouraged!!
- New at French Vanilla is the "Mistral Soap Punch Card"- buy 6 soaps and you get the 7th one free. (offer only good for the larger size soap). Come in and ask for your punch card today!
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