Would like advive for more of a cottage appeal

I'm a newbie to CG and have been seeing some others have asked for advice, so I'm taking a chance to see if you can help me...
I moved 3 yrs ago into this house, there was nothing here when I started...I really want a cottage look and I'm having a hard time.. I put the awnings and the window boxes on, made the little front porch, new sliding, windows, roof, new driveways and sidewalks...but I just can't get the front to have that welcome feeling, or that charm that a cottage has.not sure if I should line the driveways and sidewalk with flowers or hosta's or if that would be to much
see what you think...Thanks cindy

This message was edited Sep 8, 2007 6:27 PM

Hi Cindy! I think the plant that would give it instant charm is a climbing rose or two on either side of the front porch. Also, why not try one of those old-fashioned screen doors - that would look good with the roses. For plants under the picture window, how about foxglove, cleome, and the newer shorter delphiniums? It's fun to start fresh with a new 'canvas'! Have fun!

Love the peaceful look of your garden and appreciate your "dream".

Seems cottage gardens often have welcoming pathways. I can visualize a path from the street to the front door, an arbor, plantings. I can see diverting the pathway to a seating area close, under the tree. At the intersection of the street to house pathway and the seating area I'd expand to the right to include a raised planted area. Perhaps with a birdbath or tall architectural shrub.

Also, the house I grew up in in southern California had a Breezeway from the frontyard to the back. My mother had tall trained camilias against one wall . The Bay window in the dining room looked out on that breezeway and the pretty camilias. In your pic I'm seeing what may be a breezeway between the house and the garage. If it is, I can see a trellis "ceiling" over that passage with clematis or a vine of some sort covering the trellis. I have no idea of your zone. Expense wise or time wise this is not the first thing I'd build but in time I'd consider it.

your place is lovely; i am not quite sure what it needs...but it is beautiful..; sometimes with cottage ...if you put too much it starts gettng messy...your decor sorta reminds me of me and my yard....i love cottage...but i love order also...here is how i have done
order and cottage

here is another bad pic showing my full frontal view...it is so dang long (like yours)so i have to have alots of pots and stuff to balance it; plus i try to use as huge as a pot as i can as the curb appeal is lost with small containers

Thanks, for looking and for your advice...I would love a picket fence across the front but NO one has fences in the front, plus there are NO sidewalks.....so it's really hard to do the fence in the front....plus along the other side of the house is a driveway also...(HUSBAND is , into cars and garages, before he had a wife...ha) I like the idea of roses my problem being the vinyl siding and railings, for it to climb....also the look of a breezeway...
love to hear ideas..

Thanks Cindy
this is the other side of house and then the backyard that I started last year on

This is my backyard

we must be twins separated at birth...

i wasnt suggesting a picket fence...just showing you my take
on cottage gardening and 'order'.....(grin)

i personally think there are 2 types of cottage...order and non order

sounds like your hubby and mine are the same also....they like their
lawns...and cars...

you and i also have the same type of fireplace...great minds think alike

love your place:)

I love your garden beds, especially around back and that border along your driveway -- tons of "cottage charm" there!

I think you might consider adding a couple of non-plant details out front... but as Sticks said, you have to be careful not to go overboard and have it turn out cluttered rather than cute.

How about painting the front door in a brighter color, like blue or yellow? Also, the peak on your porch roof might be able to use a little detail in the center, whether it's a piece of gingerbread (nothing too frou frou, since the rest of the house is simple) or one of those iron stars or other interesting piece of ironwork.

It does look like you've got some blank space to the right of the front door to play with... you wouldn't need to have something climb up your vinyl porch posts if you found a trellis or obelisk to go next to your porch... and the nice thing about a structure like that is that it adds interest in other seasons, when your climbing rose (or clematis, or morning glories) doesn't look like much.

If you don't care for the trellis idea, you might try adding another focal point such as a big birdbath, tiered fountain, or large planter... I'd place something like that just beyond the curve of your front walk, to the right of your door and in front of your raised foundation bed (where you have grass).

I think you've got a great start, but with your house being very simple and white, you need a couple of things to draw your eye around so you appreciate all your wonderful plantings.

I second PrimroseSue's suggestion about climbers framing the front entry. I would go a step further to suggest putting in a clematis there as well, either weaving through the rose, or on its one. A clematis near the front door seems to be a common, and very charming look, that I often see in England.

You might also put in a few evergreen or other foundation plants nearest your house for a backdrop, particularly for those months when your perennials are dormant.

I think that you've already done a very lovely job!

Just saw this thread. w2b, I think you have a fantastic start!!! It's a charming little house that just needs some climbers as has been suggested, and maybe something to break up the large swath of yard. Focal points and surprises are, I think, the order of the day.

critter suggests changing your front door color. I saw on (I thin) HGTV that your front door should be your favorite color, no matter what the rest of the color scheme is. Think about it! You have a great walkway and an adorable house. It makes ME think cottage!

I'm not sure about putting a climber on the left side of the front entry... with that big, wonderful, curving bay window, I think it might look a little cramped to squeeze something in on that side of the porch. The porch isn't that large, and framing it completely around with climbers could make it look small... quaint, maybe, but small. But on the right side, it looks like you've got 5 or 6 feet between the porch and the next window.

I love the idea of adding clematis, with or without a climbing rose! I've got one on by my front porch (on just one side, LOL)... it was supposed to be 'Jackmanii' but turned out to be some other blue one... even when it's not blooming, the fluffy seed heads add interest!

I would put the clematis to the right of the door, in that expanse of white, and by "framing" I don't necessarily mean to balance plants on either side of the doorway. So with the clematis, I would place it to the right and train it across the front of that entry. To me, that would be a pretty frame, and very welcoming entryway. I'd use a fairly bold color and pick a cultivar that flowers heavily ... but that's just me. :)

Hah! See, there we go thinking alike again... so, if it were *our* front door, we'd know just what to do! LOL.

BTW, I don't know how your house is oriented, but my favorite climbing rose is 'Zephyirine Drouhin'... and it will even bloom on the north side of a house! http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/354/ There are also plenty of clematis varieties that perform well in partly to mostly shady spots.

this was just playing on the puter...basically i just added lotsa color

bottomline...i love your home....i think you are like me in that i am always trying to improve...and yet i like lotsa order....i bought this computer program on ebay it was like 10 bucks and i have had so much fun redoing stuff; i love your home:)

Groovy program, SnS. I do agree about having a certain degree of order to the madness.

I keep looking at that bay window and thinking that it would benefit from a hanging window basket fitted under it with sexy pretties spilling up and over.

wrightie..that would be great!!! and i liked the idea of some color of door....green may not be it...but some color; i also would like something at the sides of the door way....either climbers or hanging baskets spewing of stuff....

so fun i can spend someone elses money:)

lol .... I do think that it's 'easier' to design for other people's homes than my own. Sheesh, that caught me by surprise once we finally bought a place of our own.

Sticks, I had the same notion with regard to expanding the front beds to include a sweep from the driveway to the front door, on the other side of the walkway. I like the idea of leading your eye to the door with colorful plantings rather than with pavement.

Our front yard is a bit of a hill, so the double driveway looks very big and very black to me... I've tried to arrange the front landscaping to draw the eye away from all that asphalt and toward the front door. That way, it looks more like "house with attached garage" rather than like "garage with house attached." LOL

I tend toward a hodge podge style in back, partly because I want one of everything I see at the nursery... but in the front, I wanted a slightly more formal style, so I tried to think in terms of sweeps of color and repeating textures. In spring, the front bed has a sweep of daffodils, with a "river" of grape hyacinths in front and other "little bulbs" (species tulips and crocus) along the front walk, plus several small azaleas in bloom. That gives way to the purple of the lavender hedge along the driveway and the burgundy of the lilies that curve down the center of the bed, with dwarf dianthus and creeping thyme on either side of the walkway. At some point, I'll get more blooms from the irises that are spaced every so often in front of the lilies. By late summer, most of the color is up near the front walk -- balsam impatiens and torenia in the foundation bed, and the white of the garlic chives in bloom.

Let's see if I can find a photo...

critter that is lovely....:)

I love the lavender! It still smells wonderful... and there are still a couple of little blooms at the very ends of the stalks!

Thanks, this fun to read all the idea's....You can't see in this picture, but I have a rug paintted on the porch, it has geraniums in each corner..I couldn't stand a pure white porch...I was always out there washing off the foot prints! (bad)
I been thinking of maybe a dark red door...I do have a clematis on the right side of the door, its behind the branches of that pine tree...Never did bloom..this picture was taken July 1, so thing have grown a little...
I just plantted that Cinderrella crab tree in the corner.. (to the left) in july.
I thought next year I would do the pot in the middle of the garage with a tree and little flowers spelling out of it...
OK, Sticks, can you try this, make my front door a deep red or marroon, and take away the two tall trees. I would love to see what that looks like! we have one of those tall trees at the corner of the house in that raised bed...been there forever!!! My husband just asked me how you did that!! he was walking by and said "that looks like our house almost" Love the flowers coming across like that... Thanks a bunch!

Thanks, this fun to read all the idea's....You can't see in this picture, but I have a rug paintted on the porch, it has geraniums in each corner..I couldn't stand a pure white porch...I was always out there washing off the foot prints! (bad)
I been thinking of maybe a dark red door...I do have a clematis on the right side of the door, its behind the branches of that pine tree...Never did bloom..this picture was taken July 1, so thing have grown a little...
I just plantted that Cinderrella crab tree in the corner.. (to the left) in july.
I thought next year I would do the pot in the middle of the garage with a tree and little flowers spelling out of it...
OK, Sticks, can you try this, make my front door a deep red or marroon, and take away the two tall trees. I would love to see what that looks like! we have one of those tall trees at the corner of the house in that raised bed...been there forever!!! My husband just asked me how you did that!! he was walking by and said "that looks like our house almost" Love the flowers coming across like that... Thanks a bunch!
(this view shows a little more of the side)

I've really been enjoying this thread. You have a very lovely home and yard.

My only flower suggestion is phlox. To me, tall phlox shouts "cottage garden" and as a bonus, some varieties have a wonderful scent.

Since you are thinking about warming up the color of the door, what do you think about tying the color of the shutters in with the door? At first I thought of wooden ones with a subtle leaf pattern painted around the edges and a base color to coordinate with your door color. Would your hubby consider a stain to warm up the color of the concrete? Not a major change, just a hint of color (coordinating with the door color) to soften the look.

To me, your home is absolutely beautiful as is--and I love what you did with the back yard!

Aha! That's where you need a climbing rose... around the corner of the house, rambling up that blank wall to the right of the window (cute awning!) on a tall trellis. I was going to suggest letting it climb the railing also... But on second look, I thought that railing could use a windowbox instead, perpendicular to the house, just outside the door. That might be a wonderful place for some herbs -- nice and handy, especially if that door leads inside near the kitchen!

Oh, and while I love that little ball-top topiary in the side bed, it looks a little lost there to me... Is it something that you could dig up and put in a large planter, maybe use it as an accent at some corner of the walkway?

It's lots of fun playing with somebody else's "curb appeal"... just remember, we all loved your home to start with, so these are suggestions and not criticisms. :-)

Have you thought of tiling the risers on the front steps? I love that look and it would bring the color-me-up-to-the-front-door idea all the way up to the front door.

HGTV should produce a show out of us.

I would love stained concrete, but there is sooooo much of it...the front is almost 3 cars wide and goes ALL around the house.. He is proud of his concrete!!ha. I would have loved to have the edges with the brick pattern and the sidewalk to the house that way too, But in the winter he uses a bobcat to shovel....so they said it would not last... I have thought about lining the driveway and front walk with bricks, but then I think if I line with flowers no one would see the brick. That's what I mean I really flop... The little tree, is suppose to get 9 -10 feet tall...
The awnings are a dark green, tan, black, marroon.....
Thanks..

LOL, I guess 10 feet tall would be a bit much in a container! If it gets wider as it gets taller, you may need to move it out from the house a bit... although I know distance can be deceiving in photos, so it may already have enough room. Would it be possible to move it out just a bit, though, so it would be an accent at the corner of the house? That would then let you center a trellis on that side wall... unless you're just not a trellis person... :-)

okay here ya go with a burgundy door; the name of this program is sierra custom land designer home and garden suite

LOL... distances really are deceptive in photos! I looked again, and that ball-top topiary is waaay out from the side of the house... in fact, that whole bed on the side is at least twice as deep as I'd thought from the other photo!

Even if skinny cypress trees aren't your cuppa, I do like the idea of a vertical element or two in your plantings there... I've recently started using metal obelisks because I think they look great even before they get covered with a flowering vine.

ah heck if we are gonna play....here is this

in dat case ..... momma needs her window box and some trellises, lol

Seriously, SNS, you are very handy with that s/w. I have a few different landscape design tools and I get frustrated with all of them, so always go back to draft paper and pencils. I bow to thee.

and this is the ultimate

every one MUST have a pink flamingo in their front yard....

LOL

wrightie...this software is dirt cheap and is fairly easy to use....i hate puters and stuff but this software is so easy i could do it

ROFL!

Yes, that's entirely too wide an expanse of unbroken grass in the front yard... :-)

I do like your garden bench to the right of the door -- I was thinking fountain or birdbath, but I think a bench is better! I also like the bench you put around that beautiful big tree trunk... I've seen sectional cedar benches made to fit around a tree like that, for more of a rustic look...

with a window box

what else?