Beyond the Basics - Look UP at my garden

Have you begun to set up our outdoor living spaces in preparation for the summer months? Here in the northeast, summer seems to fly by so quickly that we tend to start planning much sooner than we can actually use our outdoor space so that by the time the weather warms up, we can enjoy every minute of the season.

One of the latest trends for outdoor spaces is creating a vertical garden. For those of us with small backyards (or no backyards if you're living in an apartment), this is the perfect solution if you like to care for living greenery and have limited space.

As is the case inside the home, when you don't have horizontal space to work with, go vertical. Below shows several varieties of vertical gardens. Businesses have used them as a design element to create interest and to visually soften hard surfaces such as marble, tile, concrete, etc. Better Homes & Gardens recently posted a do-it-yourself project to create a small-scale vertical garden that they call a "living picture." I'd love to see photos if you try it!