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Members in
the News --
Posted 05-17-08
The Chicago by Design
section in the first issue of Chicagoland Gardening in 2008 featured the
APLD Midwest design team of Marina and Jamie Berger. Their aptly
named landscape design business,
Pottering Around, was the focus of the article titled:
Enter Stage Left,
Correcting foot-traffic faux pas that sends visitors to a
home's non-traditional (side) entry.
Written by Cathy Jean
Maloney, the article covers a front yard landscape design solution for a
newly built property in Hinsdale. Marina summarizes; "The
challenges faced on this particular project are
something we seem to come across in all-too-many of our assignments -
bloody awful builder landscaping. "
 Like
the one in this article, the houses themselves are quite impressive to
say the least, but to finish them off and quickly get them on the
market, the contractors and builders just throw in any old sad excuse
for a landscape in order to be issued a certificate of occupancy. "It
baffles us how so much care and attention can go into building these
high-end homes and then money is just wasted on these temporary
landscapes that are brain dead design-wise."
So they did what they had
to do - come up with a successful and beautiful design. To do
this, one has to see the challenges as the real opportunity and find
solutions for the problems first and then build out from there. That is
what Jamie and Marina did with this space.
 By
adding layers of plants around the patio space and creating an enclosed
garden area with a path of decomposed granite, it gives the owner a
reason to go into the garden space. The extra layer also enclosed the
patio as a private space and forces visitors and postmen to
go all the way up to the correct entrance (on the left side of home, off
driveway) instead of cutting across the patio to middle doors as they
were doing before the new garden was installed. Once the circulation
problem was solved, the space was then finished off with beds across the
entire front of the property by the public sidewalk which brings added
visual depth and interest from the street. The gravel path also
was laid all the way along the side of the house which solved another
problem, this time of a swampy north-facing kind. Isn't good
landscape design a beautiful thing?
More? The Berger's
blog can he found here:
Pottering Around blog Updates:
Chicago Home + Garden - Design Source
Industrial strength pottering around can get a bit hectic this time
of the year. So much so that we almost forgot that our landscape design
service has been included in the March/April 2008 issue of Chicago Home
+ Garden magazine Design Sources section. Photos of a few of our gardens
in Hinsdale and River Forest, IL have also been featured.
Our thanks to those involved with creating this great local design
resource which is part of the Chicago Magazine family. |
The Midwest Chapter adds only $20 to your annual APLD dues
- an undeniable bargain. Our members form a regional coalition of designers,
contractors and artists and receive additional networking
opportunities, forums for discussion and high quality
educational opportunities not currently available through
other Midwestern organizations. 
