I almost forgot my deer resistant plants...that's pretty much everything but the roses and the veggies and a few fruits.

Then I spend most of the summer playing "hide the rose from the deer" with pretty good results so far. That's when planning out the garden beds really pays off. Gardening is never boring, out here in the country :)

I always have a pretty good idea how and where I want my beds, and yes I'm one that likes to "mirror". If you mean planting the same plant or same color across or diagonally from each other. I pay attention to texture too. Try not to put all "fluffy" in one bed or all spikey. Pay attention to dark areas in the garden and plant something lighter in color in that corner or against the hedge or shrub with dark foliage.

I like a variety of circle, square and rectangular beds, half moon beds with a circle near it for instance. Tends to make interesting paths appear as though NOT planned.

As far as worrying about zones, I buy what the local nurseries offer, can't say I've ever been really burned; most mistakes are made by my not tending properly! My garden changes as the years go by because plants eventually mature. So if it started out an all sun garden, it may now be half shade/half sun. I plant accordingly.

Schoolhouse- I don't know if I've ever seen your beds from a distance. Do you have any pictures? I'd love to se the half moon with the circle nearby :)

You're lucky to be able to shop without zone worries. All the stores that sell plants are in Spokane, which is mostly zone 5b. I'm 25 miles away, in zone 4a, so I really have to be careful, when I shop. Even so, I've noticed some places sell zone 6 or 7, without always mentioning it's probably an annual in this area. I guess it's buyer beware.

I'm redesigning a bit as we speak, since the deer found my Fantin Latour roses last night (I just noticed it about half an hour ago). I'll probably move them into the fairy garden and put something else in their place. They were right by the front porch and usually the deer don't come up to the house, but it's been pretty dry and the farm machinery may have scared them out of the field. "Hide the rose from the deer" continues! LOL

I have to very carefully plan my gardens due to having a 37x97 lot...so that answers that question LOL.

At the old house, gardens just kinda "happened" sometimes...if an area struck my fancy then I started digging! Not here though. Not enough room. There is definitely a master plan!

Lavender,
For me, it is a little of each. I may plant the plants but not the colors.

That being said, I am planning the new rose garden I am about to plant in much more detail than is usual for me. I've had a grand time doing it. I am measuring and sketching to scale and moving around. (Mainly moving because I keep buying roses). Ah well. It is fun.

kay

Kay- That sounds like a lot of fun. What kind of roses have you ordered? Are you putting any companion plants, or just roses?

Krycek- What about your partner's house that you might end up living in? Is there plenty of space for gardens there? Too bad you can't have a city home and a country retreat...fresh air and lots of garden space for the summer :)

Lass, I don't have the circle with the crescent, just the crescent. I was just giving an example of how some shapes can compliment each other. I've probably posted pics of my garden from a distance before, it's not that big and I generally end up posting what looks like the same photo over and over, just in different seasons. ha.

Not that the circle bed hasn't been on my mind for several years. It would have to be closer to the large Mock Orange than I would like, plus my septic line runs right across the perfect place for it. If ever the line would have to be dug up (which may very well happen in 4yrs. - to replace it) then the new circle bed would have to be dug up too. Lowes has their little boxwood shrubs on sale, too. Ugh. Never say never tho!

Lavender,
I will be putting in some companion plants Not yet sure on all of them.

I have ordered more of the Old Garden roses, but a few that aren't old garden. It is Heavy on Chinas. A couple of Austins, Reine des Violettes, Polka, Fire and Ice, Pink Ganette, Lemon Spice, Lilac Dawn, Charles de Gaulle, Hadley and Tower Bridge, Seafoam, Louis Phillipe, Pam's Pink, Mme Zazu, Jean Cote, and a few others. Most of these are from Vintage. RdV is from Antique Rose Emporium and a few are from Heirloom.

You can get an idea of the garden from these pics:

and another view: (a couple of little bands are shown here)

kay

I used to make drawings and plans on paper.
Now I just make plans in my head and work towards that as a goal.

If it doesn't work, I adapt.

Ditto what Annie said...

I've tried to do the whole planning bit...didn't work. Trouble is my plans keep changing, plants keep getting shifted around (which is difficult when you are drawing it out on paper!). Also hard when you bring home a plant from the nursery that wasn't fitted into your design. Lol, and I'm always bringing home those kind of plants ;-)

Now I pretty much plan and plant as I go, and am the first to admit that my garden lacks good 'design'!
CMK

I put my cottage garden plan on paper when we first built the house so that I knew what would be path and what would be border. It did not include plants. Then I planted many plants I brought from my old house. As a few years went on I realized I didn't have enough interest throughout the seasons so I put a plan on paper for the plants for each border. But then the roses were a mess with bugs and blackspot, so that eventually changed to daylilies, I didn't have enough fall interest on one side so I planted a bunch of asters, etc. So, I started with a plan that worked for the most part but then needed to be tweaked as the years progressed.

Now I mainly "think" about an area for a while (sometimes years) before planting but even now sometimes I am surprised by a sudden change in plans. Just this year I was planning on trying roses again in the backyard by the split-rail fence, but after the daylilies near the fence bloomed I decided to do a daylily border. Hmmmm...that's twice daylilies beat out roses in my garden!

I usually make sure to include lots of shrubs for different seasonal interest as well. I haven't drawn out any paper plans since the cottage area.

I had a rough plan in my head but I rarely ever followed it, my garden just sort of fell in to place. I'd plant a bit then sit back and think...now what will work with that :).

Annette

Organic Kitten, your pictures look like my back bed last spring, except I had to put edging in immediately because it takes St Augustine grass about 15 minutes to start spreading! I have been quite pleased with the growth over the summer even with our heat, and can hardly wait until next spring to see more growth and bigger blooms! I did plan this bed to some degree, but will probably have to make changes as plants grow.

I'm a mostly in-my-head planner, although I find it useful at times to scribble rough drawings on copies of the property survey to test out ideas for shaping the spaces. I've tried the draw-to-scale thing and it wasn't worth the effort - the scribbles on the survey work just as well for me. I have an (mental) overall plan for the front and back that deals with the 'feel' I want and the color schemes. That guides my plant purchases. I rarely - very rarely - buy something that I don't know exactly where it is going to go. I do spend a fair bit of time - and have a lot of fun - tracking down exactly what I want for a particular spot. My first garden - at our previous house - was much more random in plan and exection. I was not happy with it when we left there for here, so I resolved to make this one a much more coherent garden. I think I've largely achieved that and we're quite happy with this garden.

I do plan new beds (in my mind) and somewhat when I am revising old beds. My biggest problem is that after I complete the planting I will then have a brilliant idea of what I *should* have done and sometimes begin to move plants or add more. Of course this changes the entire plan! I also have difficulty spacing no matter how hard I try. Had true success with that in only one bed this year and it still looks bare to me. My roses are *almost* spaced far enough apart altho I will be moving one next spring.

I used to draw to scale on graph paper but always ended up deviating from it anyhow so IMO there is not much point in spending the time doing so. Sort of works to install the major plants in a bed then 'wing' the rest.

A little of each.
I like to stand in the area and visualize what the flower beds' shape would fit, what plants would look nice for their shape and color.
Also do some drawings on graph paper, just to keep things in perspective. It's a great winter past time to plan and dream of gardens.

To actually create the garden is another thing. It's always a combination of plans, what takes my eye at the garden center and what I start myself. Once the plants are sitting there in pots, the arrangement often changes, sometimes a lot,sometimes a little.
It's all good !

LOL, lavender, I would love to have two houses!!!!!!!! Too expensive though! And then we have to leave the cats in the city, etc. It's just too much! We might consider it at some point in the future!

And surely there's tons of room to garden at the old house so I can certainly plant what I want wherever I want. The soil is terribly clay so that is a limiting factor :(.

And luckygal, that's so funny! That happens to me too...after I'm done putting a garden in I have a wonderful idea but then the garden's already in...I hate that!

Krycek- Do you have any neighbors with horses? They work great for fertilizer :) How many kitties do you have?

Despite all my careful planning, I do have to move a bunch of plants this week. My geraniums (pretty purple ones) turned out to be a deer magnet. One is munched down to stems, so I think those will look great...in my mom's yard! LOL

Lol - I do tend to draw everything out, but then change it a bit when I'm actually planting and moving things around! Since I made such a geometrical layout, I keep that in AutoCAD, but the plantings are much harder to actually draw accurately. They never seem to grow in nice neat circles, lol!

And yes, I'm constantly tweaking. Well, constantly for me. I don't dare move plants unless it is cool and rainy, or I fear I will doom them to die a quick, horrible death. ;) So, mostly I move them in the spring.

I did some planning in the beginning, but now am to the stage where I wander around with my spading fork and a plant in my hand looking for a spot.
This fall I will have a small new bed, 20' x 5'. I have a dwarf nandina so far, but am at a loss of what else to plant. Eastern exposure, alkaline soil, which I will try to improve. I could have a couple of plants that would reach 5'I would like mostly shrubs, and I could plant lots of bulbs this fall.Anybody have any ideas of what else I could plant? This will be up against a small new addition.

Not really at first... Mostly have inherited gardens when buying a house. But though the years as I have put my stamp on the gardens they have evolved and so has my way of gardening. Now when I want to put in a new bed I think of what I want the garden to look like and what purpose it will serve.

I look at it as a space or room. What activites will be in that garden area. Will I want to sit out there, wander around within the garden, mainly viewing garden, picking garden, etc... I ID if there needs to be various entry/exit points, design for using gardening tools ( wheel barrow for example), privacy, paths, whether I will have a water feature etc.... Then I do what I want. LOL

At least I have a plan in my head. Keeps me on track, sorta. I do try to have a base plan drawn up. That way when I have an idea what I want to do in an area, I purchase plants that fit. I plant for shade or sun, by height and width etc... I find I don't have to move so much if I keep in mind what I want in certain areas. I have in the past planted a tree that reaches 20 feet tall and 15 feet wide at maturity and what I had wanted was one that was half that size.

I find that as I go along, I want attractive gardens that I don't have to worry so much about suckers, root issues, pruning, messy fruit and invasive plants. I want a garden that kinda maintains itself without a lot of effort on my part (outside of deadheading and general maintenance). That is where a design plan comes into play so much....

I have a friend who is a successful landscape designer and she has shared some of her teaching tools in her residential landscape class with me. Using them helps me stay more focused and on track. Great tools.

I guess a little of each. I either fall in love with a plant (last year it was hydrangeas) and spend 6 months trying to plan exactly where to put it... Or I realize this or that garden needs height or a color or something and spend 6 months (or more) trying to find something to put there.

Lois in PA