Savvy shoppers know that often the best time to buy something is after “the season” is over, or before it begins. According to Tom Altgelt, a Colorado landscape designer serving the Boulder/Denver area, this is very much the case with garden designs. “I often encounter potential clients who think they may as well wait until spring before having a garden designed. I tell them that there are actually many advantages to starting the planning process in the fall.” Specifically, a homeowner can have a landscape much quicker, and end up with a result they are more pleased with, while saving money.
Altgelt says, “The first good reason for starting the process in the fall is that we are much more likely to get a great contractor.” Evidently landscape contractors’ business tends to slow down in the winter, which can make it possible to get a better deal or to book a contractor who wouldn’t be available in the spring. The most on-demand contractors can be difficult or impossible to hire if the design process is put off until spring.
In addition, many people are surprised by how much of the actual landscaping can be done in the fall. In Tom’s words: “In the Boulder/Denver area, the weather is mild enough to do a lot of work in the fall, and even over the winter, especially on a southern exposure.” If a project is started in the autumn, the “hardscape” construction of moving the earth and creating rock features, paving, and retaining walls can often be finished by spring.
For the massive rock features some of his clients want, Tom has to drive off-road through Wyoming ranch country to pick out rocks weighing up to 20 tons. Next he tags them and arranges for their removal. If he has too late a start, those rocks could be snowed in until spring! “It’s a race against time for me to get them out.”
Most shrubs and trees love to be planted in the fall, so they can put down their roots over the winter. “That way they are ready to burst onto the scene with flowers and foliage in the spring.” Even better, nurseries often mark down their plant material at the end of the season, so it’s another chance to save some money. Some specialty plants will need to be ordered for spring, and it’s important to get the order placed in time to have the best selection and highest quality.
Altgelt points out that those who get an autumn head start on their project can have a garden they can enjoy looking at come spring. Otherwise, they could be putting up with a great big muddy mess lasting through the spring and even into the summer. “This can be rather distressing, especially when you consider the alternative.” If one can get through the back hoe and mud stage over the winter, when things are barren anyway, so much the better.
And, of course, the most important consideration is the end result. Optimally, a garden will be pleasing all year round, but Altgelt says most are designed to impress us in the spring and summer. That’s because there is such a wide range of plant choices that exhibit their full splendor in the warm months. Designing a landscape in the fall makes it easier to conceptualize plantings that will provide interest year-round. For example, “a beautiful fall combination of perennials is the Sedum of Autumn Joy, which is reddish or pinkish, next to Salvia, which turns deep purple. These colors resonate with each other. Next if you add the bright golden of the black-eyed Susan, you have a stunning collage of colors.”
The next challenge is to design a landscape that is lovely in the winter. “After the leaves fall and plants begin to go dormant, they reveal their more subtle, internal structure to us. This too can be beautiful, and we take this into account more readily when we design a landscape in the fall.” Some plants, like the evergreens and some grasses, are colorful in the winter. There is a red twig shrub and yellow twig shrub with colorful bare stems after the falling of the leaves. “The earth also begins to reveal more of its sculpted forms when the plants have shed their lushness.”
In Tom’s experience, the fall and winter lend themselves to listening and contemplation, which present opportunities for a connection with the land itself. He has found that most people who own property feel a deep connection with their land. By truly listening to his clients and to the nature within the land, he finds his best inspiration.
“It is wonderful that the practical aspects of saving money and enjoying a beautiful garden sooner go hand in hand with the soulful aspects of co-creating with nature and each other.” For Tom Altgelt, combining the practical with the spiritual allows an exceptional outcome to be achieved.
For more information about landscape design, contact Thomas Altgelt, award-winning Denver, Colorado landscape designer. Visit www.altgelt.com to view Denver, Colorado landscape designs, as well as landscape and garden designs in other areas.
