Pool Landscaping Ideas for a Beautiful, Low-Maintenance,
Safe Pool Area
If you've got a pool, you probably have plenty of summertime guests, both kids and adults, who help you get maximum enjoyment out of this luxury home feature. However, when you're the owner, you're the one who maintains it in its pristine condition, which can involve considerable time and due diligence. In fall, you may be filtering fallen leaves on a daily basis. In summer, you may wish for a little more shade from the mid-afternoon sun. These are just idle thoughts, until you decide to put together some pool landscaping ideas that lighten your work load, increase the attractiveness and usefulness, while maintaining a safe environment.
Before you start a list of pool landscaping ideas, it's a good idea to first assess the functional and safety issues for your particular situation. Do you have a lot of neighborhood kids over in the summer? If so, do you have fencing, a deck or railing which prevents toddlers from wandering into the pool area? If not, you'd better make plans to correct this before going crazy with lovely plantings. Is the entire pool surrounded by non-skid paving materials? When you're satisfied that you've considered safety and usability for pool users, it's time to compile pool landscaping ideas that decrease maintenance and increase attractiveness.
Redwood planters, placed strategically around the pool, can serve to break up areas, slowing down kids who might go streaking across the pool surround, or just to provide a little semi-enclosed bistro spot for you and a friend to sit and chat. A couple of four foot planters, placed at right angles to each other is a pool landscaping idea that adds safety, beauty and function all at once. Suitable planting choices depend on your need.
If you'd enjoy a little shade while chatting on a hot summer's day, try some tropical, big-leaved plants, such as Elephant's Ear, palms or large ferns. You can also attach a trellis to the planter, allowing you to hang baskets of sun-loving flowers for a sparkling summer display. Use the planters for easy-care annuals, tough customers like gazanias, ice plant or marigolds. Choose flowers that mix well in your overall landscaping. The right color schemes are great mood setters. If evergreens dominate your yard landscaping, you can counter with pool landscaping ideas that put a little pizazz into the setting.
If you've got a cabana or gazebo in the pool area, this is a lovely place to have plantings of shade loving plants, surrounding the entries, providing an inviting effect.
Another terrific and economical pool landscaping idea is to install trellises, planted with climbing annuals, such as morning glory vines, which separate the pool area from your lawn or deck. These plants are almost indestructible and grow quickly to a magnificent display of blooms. There are varieties which grow to 12 feet in a single season. A six foot trellis will be covered, spilling over to the other side by early July. This is a real show stopper by the pool. When fall comes, you just chop them down. You don't obstruct light in the cold months and in spring you just plant again.
Fall and winter give you plenty of time to explore online and in plant catalogs for all of the pool landscaping ideas you've got room to put in place. Graph out a to-scale drawing of your pool area. Come spring, you'll be planting and creating the most delightful pool spot in the neighborhood!
