Landscaping with Plants

CEBU, Philippines - As anyone who loves plants can tell you, there is something exhilarating about plants, especially when used with imagination. Plants can frame a view (or obliterate it), provide a focal point in a room, soften hard architectural lines, and even alter the scale of a room. To achieve such effects, you need to know just a few basic guidelines.

Over cups of iced tea amidst foliage and palms, I met up with Nicole Ong, daughter of George and Sylvia Liok from Palompon, Leyte to learn more about creating and enhancing gardens and the elements of landscaping.

 A graduate of Bachelor of Science in Interior Design at the University of San Carlos, Nicole is first and foremost a dedicated mother to daughter Georgina and a loyal wife to husband, businessman Charles Ong. Her passion and keen interest in plants, gardening and landscaping led to the establishment of Garden Gears and Landscape, where she personally attends to her plant nursery located at Old Bonifacio St., in Banilad.

 Cebuanos, in general, are beginning to look upon their grounds not so much as a means to impress their neighbors - although this purpose will probably always persist - but as usable, livable extensions of the house itself, as outdoor rooms to be treated and used in much the way indoor rooms are. This new concept of the home seeks to achieve five main goals through landscaping:

Privacy.

Most people want their houses and grounds to provide some sense of shelter from the crowding and tension of an urban world, a place where shoes come off and shirts, too, where tired feet can be soothed by cool grass, where green foliage helps the mind forget the city traffic. They seek seclusion yet not at the cost of a feeling of confinement.

Comfort.

The house is there to shelter you from the weather, the grounds ought to allow you to enjoy it. Trees can filter bright sunlight and absorb its heat. Thick foliage can also suppress street noise and even capture pollutants from the air while freshening it with oxygen.

Beauty.

Whatever you see outdoors from wherever you stand in your house or on your grounds is your landscape, whether or not you own what you are looking at. Good planning can include a neighbor's beautiful tree while screening out his garage. Making your own garden attractive for you and for passersby depends on attention to details, the combination of plant forms, colors and texture of leaves, grass and paths to create interesting contrasts, the placement of plants to lead the eye to bright points of interest and to suggest spaciousness.

Convenience and safety.

Paths must not meander meaninglessly and guests should not have to walk through the kitchen, or worse still, through a garage to get to a garden. Both walks and doorways should be determined by a logical traffic pattern. Steps should be lighted for safety, and the design of treads and risers should make for easy climbing.

Ease and maintenance. Planting a fast-growing shrub that requires continual pruning may be a mistake when a slow growing variety would serve better. Raised planting beds and plant containers can make gardening easier, not only because they reduce the amount of stooping necessary, but because they eliminate the problem of grass invading the flowerbeds.

 These five goals are the ones that most people agree on. But the only essential one is a landscape that will please its inhabitants. (FREEMAN)