Help create a mountain stone border garden

We would like to create a border garden that will be viewed from the front door all the way through our home. I want the area in front of the woods to be edged with 3" mountain stone and stacked maybe 9" tall in a long sweeping curving manner and fill this area with perennials and a dogwood and any other plants that are drought tolerant. However, this project seems a bit overwhelming and I would love your insight on how to begin.

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Jun 19, 2014
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Planning landscape work
by: Anonymous

Thanks for the question.

You are not alone. Almost all DIY projects start out this way.

DIY questions like,

Can we do this?
Can we afford this?
How do we do it?
Where do we start?
And many more.

Some people actually end up biting off more than they can chew, or tackling projects that are beyond their abilities.

How long of a wall are you building? Are you purchasing the stone, or do you have access to free stone? How much time will you have to spend working (Maintaining) the garden beds? Have you estimated how much materials you will need?

A basic landscaping job will start with a plan or design, estimating the materials, then the preparation work, Then the install.

Don't forget to include the sequence of work to be done. This will make you more efficient.

I put together some how-to modules on a few different projects on our website. They are more like a book instead of a step-by-step, dig hole, dump in rock, pack base, stack stones, etc.... approach. The reason I did this was I wanted to encourage a whole thought process rather than following directions. Directions are fine, but unforeseen traffic jams happen which require thinking outside the box to find another way.

This link to the first page of "How to build a stone wall" does just that. Walks through some of the things I have to think about before I start a project.

https://www.dream-yard.com/wallsite.html#.U6L5tn5zZMs

To make a project more manageable and affordable, you can sometimes break it down into sections. Maybe focus on completing the wall this year and the garden beds in the fall or maybe even next year.

From visiting a few homeowner DIY projects gone wrong. I also decided to write this article on Landscaping Planning.

https://www.dream-yard.com/landscaping-planning.html#.U6MKBX5zZMs

Thanks for the pictures along with the question. We would love to see a before and after.

Some food for thought for you. Thanks again for visiting our site.

If you have some more specific details to give on what makes you feel overwhelmed, I would be happy to address each one for you.

Thanks

Dream-yard team.

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