At a Michigan home surrounded on three sides by neighbors,

Natural
winner
By KRISTIN JASS ARMSTRONG
At a Michigan home
surrounded on three
sides by neighbors,
the yard had little privacy and less
visual oomph. But with ample helpings of
colorful perennials and a whole lot of rock-scaping,
this couple’s yard became a stop-the-car beauty spot.
Inspired by the New American Garden style, a skillful designer
created a landscape that thrills the eyes and other senses.
It’s proof that you only need a little land for a lot of effect.
APRIL 2006
Photo by SHAWN DE LA FORET
Colors and textures mix gorgeously in this landscape.
Here, the elements of an inviting, tactile tableau
include the bold heads of purple coneflower, the pale
billowy feathers of the ornamental grass pennisetum
Karley Rose, the million soft tips of a concolor fir and
an outcropping of cool, hard Chilton stone.
Photos by SHAWN DE LA FORET
C
onnie and Greg Hanson have done what we all long to do:
they have brought the lakefront landscape right to their front
door. With winding stone paths, waving ornamental grasses, bold
washes of colorful perennials, and a mix of hardwoods and conifers,
the couple transformed their entire 146-by-181-foot lot in Stevensville, Mich., into a year-round natural retreat.
Utilizing all of their outdoor square footage, the Hansons and their
landscape designer created far more than a garden. This is a customtailored landscape that provides every room in the house fabulous
views through all four seasons — without a blade of turf grass in
sight. Plus, Connie has plenty of options for bringing the outdoors
in by clipping flowers, plants and cuttings from blooming shrubs all
the way from June through October.
Gene de la Foret and his son, Shawn, of Nature’s Way Landscaping in Stevensville, worked with the Hansons to craft the organic
look. The completed project is so sharp that it captured a prestigious
“Honor Award” for Landscape Design in 2004 from the Perennial
Plant Association, a national professional trade group for the perennial plant industry. But the real prize is that the style, though dramatic, requires remarkably minimal upkeep, fertilization or water.
New style for the new world
The naturalistic bent of the Hansons’ yard is heavily inspired by the
“New American Garden” style pioneered by nationally acclaimed landscape architects Wolfgang Oehme and James van Sweden. Gene de la
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Foret says he fell in love with the approach while working with Oehme
and van Sweden on a number of projects (including Oprah Winfrey’s
former home in northwest Indiana, and Crystal Mountain Ski Resort
in Thompsonville, Mich.).
Now his firm specializes in the style, characterized by combining
“hardscape” elements like rock, stone, and water with “softscape” perennials, ornamental grasses and other plants that flow within the
natural landscape.
In the Hansons’ yard, although it is nestled in the Sunset Dunes
subdivision with neighbors on three sides, the design affords privacy
via bounteous layers of shrubs and taller trees. Connie loves rocks
and wanted to introduce some unique groupings in her yardscape,
so she and Gene blended curving brick paths and dramatic slabs of
stone into the design.
She also enjoys working in the garden, and her yard affords her
plenty of “dirty hand” time in the spring, when she can be found
cutting back old growth and rearranging specimens. But in the summer, when most other gardeners are frantically weeding, she sits on
her patio, enjoying her outdoor retreat, because the thickly layered
plantings discourage weeds.
(Opposite page) Every detail in the garden functions as part of
one enormous welcome mat, whether it’s the exuberant daylilies (clockwise from upper left), a well-crafted lamppost, the
ornamental grasses waving, or the winding path that is designed
for meandering.
Four-season fireworks
If you visit the Hansons today, you will be greeted by a yard shimmering with a thousand shades of yellow and green as leaves, buds
and shoots return. Connie’s stone pathways, blanketed in creeping
thyme, wind from the front to side yard, converging in a much-used
round patio area, her favorite spot for a morning mug of coffee.
In mid-summer, the pinks, purples and oranges of small irises and
daylilies, Black-eyed Susans and butterfly bushes surround the house.
Hydrangeas and rhododendrons are bursting with huge white, pink,
and lavender caps. Bamboo is shooting skyward along with a myriad
of plumed ornamental grasses.
When cooler September days set in, blue Russian sage and merlotcolored sedum share space with a riotous border of untamed fiery red
sumac. Lipstick-pink patio roses sway in the lake breezes. Drive by in
December and great, deep green junipers and hemlocks stand quiet
watch over the yard.
Though she loves the languid summer evenings in her yard, Connie says she still enjoys this time of year most. “It’s so exciting seeing
the shoots of color push through the black dirt,” she says. “The landscape is different every day, and no matter where I am in the yard,
something is happening.”
Rock on
Connie’s favorite element is the dramatic piles of large rocks, especially the grouping by the mailbox on which she sits while browsing
through the day’s stack of letters and catalogs. But she also adores
hydrangeas, and the yard is filled with a multitude of the hearty,
big bloomers. The de la Forets planted oak-leaf hydrangeas, which
are ideal as screen plantings (four to six feet when mature), but also
display splashy purple, orange and red leaves in the fall, along with a
variety of snowcap and snowball specimens. Every fall, Connie dries
wheelbarrows full of hydrangeas that she gives away to covetous
neighbors, saving a few for her own projects like a dramatic swag for
the entryway.
Photos by SHAWN DE LA FORET
(This Page) The Russian sage (photo below), a year-round
bloomer, has stems that are coated with a fragrant oil that
when wiped on your palm, is a treat for your nose. A shaded
glade (lower right) is a haven for Ligularia Desdemona, while
purple coneflowers (upper right) bask in the sun, their vivid
color ensuring they get attention.
Get it yourself
For the New American look, incorporate perennials and shrubs
that blend natural and ornamental styles, rocks and water elements,
conifers and native hard woods. De la Foret recommends mimicking the natural landscape with big, bold blocks of color. “Look at
an open field — you see big swatches of green grass, golden dunes,
purple wildflowers, and blue sky. Simple but bold. You can re-create that look and feel in your own yard.” Just get your plan together
and start creating. For ideas, you could try:
Nature’s Way Landscaping
Stevensville, Michigan; www.natureswayinc.com; (269) 429-1694
Michigan State University Extension
Free advice about agricultural and environmental questions or issues from Michigan State University staff and faculty. Each Michigan County has an extension office — see website for a complete directory. www.msue.msu.edu; main Lansing office: (517) 355-2308
Chicago Botanic Garden
The Chicago Botanic Garden has 2.2 million plants and a host of
plant experts. For one-on-one advice from Master Gardeners and
professional staff, visit their Plant Information Service at www.chicagobotanic.org/plantinfo/PlantInfoService.html (in the Chicago
Gateway Center) or call (847) 835-0972. www.chicagobotanic.org
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