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Landscaping Design
- Landscape Design and the Designing Process Landscape design is the process of analysis, planning, creation and/or construction of exterior spaces utilizing plant materials and appropriate hardscape elements including incidental paving and building materials. A professional Suffolk County landscape design company is an individual who is qualified through education, training and professional experience to practice landscape design for monetary compensation.
- What does it take to be a landscape design company on Suffolk or Nassau County? It takes a thorough grounding in the principles of landscape design, the capability of using these principles to translate a client's wants and needs into a creative reality, the ability to graphically communicate the design, knowledge of plant material and knowledge of soil and hydrology.
Full Plantings
Fill area creating a visual paradise,
Privacy Trees, Raised Berms
Close off public with a crafty design with privacy trees to add a pleasant area on either side
Masonry
- Masonry is as much as an art as it is a craft. It requires a strong understanding of techniques, materials and implementation. But, in the end, it is also about the customers own personal preferences. At Outdoor Masters we have all of these traits, honed over the years through experience and practice. But unlike other masonry companies, we also stress the vital importance to satisfying our customers own personal preferences. Stylish hardscapes and artisan touches call for a mason’s expertise.
- Masonry is a trade that goes back centuries. The first century Romans built much of the ancient Coliseum using concrete-like materials, and skilled stone artisans constructed the Roman Empire’s famous network of roads. You can still see their work today. Whether you choose poured concrete with designed-in theme and accents, stone retaining walls and patios, walkways, or interlocking wall and paving elements, masonry adds lasting beauty that can transform your outdoor surroundings. Often chosen for its strength, weather resistance and fire protection, today’s masonry is also a good choice for energy efficiency and low maintenance
Paths & Walkways
- Heading down the garden path isn’t just a cliché; it’s a phrase that speaks volumes about the wonderful allure of well-planned landscaping. You want your outdoor greenscapes to beckon to you, to appeal to the kids, grownups, cats and other wild creatures in your life. Long Island walkway company, Outdoor Masters can make this happen. Plug in the perfect set of paths and walkways, using your own wild creativity and you’ll make it happen.
Slate, popular for walkways, works well here in combination with other materials to help create stairs and a mortar less terraced front walk for a rustic setting. Traffic and use dictate the width of your walkway. Four feet of width is enough to walk side-by-side, for instance, but overall, a walkway is wider and more formal than a path. The same materials you might consider for a patio are likewise excellent choices for your garden walkways, and a little planning effort can pay off in usability.
Everyone enjoys mysterious garden coves and corners that invite you to explore, but experts suggest limiting the number of meanders, especially if you are planning a main walkway that will get regular and frequent use, such as from a garage to your house. Take a good look at the area. Is the path you have in mind a place where people will probably walk? Curves and hills are interesting but if the path is too serpentine, people will take shortcuts. - Width and compatibility are key, generally a main walkway should be at least three feet wide, so everyone, including seniors and wheelchair users, can get around. While it may not be possible to avoid walkways along steep slopes or with many stairs, accessibility should play a role in your thinking. Make sure your landscape planner and contractor include edging to hold pavers, boards or gravel in place for smoother, more secure walkways.
Would certain materials and colors complement or clash with your home, or existing landscape or hardscape. Many homeowners want to enhance or improve existing landscaping, so use compatible materials. - Safety
Walkways and patios should be built level with surrounding terrain for easier mowing and maintenance, in addition to ensuring safe footing.
Transitions between steps should be well-spaced and avoid the use of materials that are too-varied (provoking tripping feet) or smooth (potentially slippery when wet). Stairs should be as wide as practical and standard in height and pitch.
Outdoor lighting enables you to enjoy your landscape and garden during the evening. New styles of wireless solar-powered LED fixtures have made placing illumination easier than ever. In traditional-style lighting, make sure to use longer lasting bulb types and fixtures that are weather protected.
Here are some other general safety tips: - • Sidewalks and walkways should be a minimum 36 inches wide, and wider at turns.
• Handrails should be provided at stairs and risers.
• Elevated paths should have 3-foot high guardrails.
• All walking surfaces and transitions should be level.
• Adequate, non-glare lighting should be used where required.
• Safety and security fencing should be part of your design.
• Storage should be provided for landscaping tools and other items that might cause injury.
• Surfaces should be free from standing water; adequate drainage areas should be provided.
The bottom line is that proper design not only enhances your landscape and green space experience, it reduces risk and the liability concerns that can accompany it. - We are proud to be a Belgard distributor and installer.
Boulders Stairs, Natural Planting Beds, Walkways
Use Boulders to add that nature feel, not so formal Design
Curves, Bold Square, Puzzle Style
Add different style in to create various areas
Lawn & Sod
- Make sure that ‘the grass is greener’ in your landscaping plan.
A panorama of green grass outside our windows seems to be a basic American right, an essential part of home landscaping. - Lawns and landscaping provide that encouraging sign each spring that life is returning, and in summer, that lush green turf becomes an invitingly cool place in which to wriggle your toes. The downside in the equation is maintenance; when you are done with all the watering, fertilizing, weeding, and your perfect lawn awaits, for many of us, the labor is well worth these sometimes almost Herculean efforts. Long Island sod installers, Outdoor Masters can install sod that can literally go from dirt to lawn in one day.
- Sod or seed?
Labor has a lot to do with whether you choose to place sod or plant seed, and the basic tradeoff is cost vs. labor. - Brand new homes characteristically have that barren look that many homeowners ache to replace with finished landscaping as quickly as possible.
- Using pre-grown commercial grasses harvested in the form of sod is the quickest way to bring green to your home’s exterior landscape. Planting a lawn from seed is less expensive. You can also select from a greater range of grass types by starting your lawn "from scratch."
- Sod
If planting a lawn with seed is like buying a "you-bake" pizza, then commercially grown sod is having that pizza cooked and delivered to your door. - Commercial growers select the best grass mixes and varieties for your area, cultivate and harvest them by slicing them into rolls, then deliver them by truck.
- For many homeowners the payoff is saving the backbreaking effort of fertilizing, planting, watering, then watching, hoping pests and weeds will not undo all the hard work. You can use your sodded lawn weeks earlier than one that is seeded, and it will immediately help control erosion. Another big plus is that you can lay sod during those times of the year when seedlings won’t grow quickly.
- Your landscape contractor looks for four things when purchasing sod: freshness, soil type, thickness, and weed content. Sod, like any crop, is perishable. Your contractor will check to see whether your local sod supplier harvests and stores sod, or harvests and delivers to order the same day. Expect commercially grown sod to run 35 cents a square foot and up.
- The best sod should contain little soil, allowing the sod to more quickly establish a better root structure. The first few days are critical, however; sod roots are less than half an inch thick, which can dry out faster, and so require more watering while they establish.
- The soil used in the sod should be similar to that on your property, because different soil types may drain differently, or the roots may not penetrate the subsoil properly. Weeds are another concern.
- When commercially grown sod is installed, it should be tight, with varying seams like brickwork. Your contractor should not overlap or stretch the sod, which can shrink as it naturally dries slightly during establishment, forming exposed edges and gaps.
- Edges that don’t touch can also die, although it is normal for some browning to occur briefly during the first few weeks.
- Sod must be watered more frequently during the first few weeks, at least once a day, and more often in dry climates. Rolling the sod is necessary during the first few days to remove any gaps between the sod and the soil underneath. Avoid foot traffic until the sod is well established.
- Mowing should be avoided for the first week or so. Until the sod is well established, plan to mow to a height at least 50 percent taller than you will later want. If you want three-inch grass, you will want to initially mow it to 4.5 inches. Make sure to add some commercial nitrogen soil amendment one month after planting, and again in the fall. While it depends on the grass variety you choose, remember that taller grass is usually is hardier and more drought tolerant than shorter-cropped lawns. Homeowner never has to leave the fairway, with outdoor putting green available.
- Seeding
Planting your own grass by seed or by plugs is another way to establish a lawn. Your landscaper should be quite easily able to handle the job of site preparation, seeding and initial care. - You can also plant for your specific need: Will your lawn be planted in the shade or the sun? Will it become a beautiful viewscape, or will your kids make it the local soccer practice field?
- Traffic, climate and placement will determine what grass variety is right for your lawn, but in all cases, choose a grass seed variety that germinates vigorously and has a low level of weed seeds or non-grass contamination.
- Soil should be raked after planting, so the seeds are adequately covered; and in many climates, experts recommend spreading straw over newly planted areas to protect them from burning or drying out. Use about one bale of straw for every five hundred square feet of lawn; later, the straw will break down and become compost that will help keep grass healthy.
- The best time to plant a lawn is in the late spring or early summer, so that your lawn is firmly established and healthy by the time it goes dormant in late fall and winter. Surprisingly, even in mild climates, lawn grasses slow their growth and may become slightly brown in winter months, which is normal.
- New grass should reach a height of at least three inches before it is mowed for the first time. Gardeners recommend keeping mower cutters sharp; instead of cleanly cutting grass blades, dull cutters tend to catch and uproot new seedlings.
- Site Preparation
Adequate site preparation can be the most important factor for success in establishing your lawn and turf, but it is usually the most neglected task. - Site preparation is the same whether you plant seed or sod. The process begins with careful removal of debris, like construction material, rocks and weeds. Be sure to grade about an inch lower where grass adjoins driveways or walkways, so your lawn will be level with them when it grows in.
- For better results in thin soil, the top layer should be removed and stored while the ground is rototilled, debris removed, and weeds pulled. Afterwards, replace the topsoil or add additional soil.
- Soil should be tested for pH levels, so the correct soil amendments and compost material may be added to compensate for acidic or alkaline conditions. Once rototilled, soil should rest and settle before planting or sodding, and rain can help this process.
- To remove weeds from your soil, water it; watch to see what grows, then remove larger plants and treat the soil with a pre-emergent herbicide. Commercial fertilizers will often contain an herbicide, such as Roundup.
- After Planting
Watering is critical, whether you plant sod or seed. During the first 14 days, water your lawn daily; then, reduce watering frequency but water longer at each interval. Keep foot traffic at a minimum, even after a first mowing. - New lawns generally do not weather drought conditions until they have been established for a year or so, but roots will get a better foothold if the new lawn is aerated after the first two to four months. Used correctly (making 20-30 holes per square foot), punches will open drainage in the soil and allow root paths.
- Sods generally control weeds better during initial growth because they hinder germination and block sunlight from weed seeds in the subsoil.
- Instead of trying to find each and every weed immediately after planting your seeded or sod lawn, it is a lot easier to simply wait until the following spring when a pre-emergent herbicide can be applied to the entire lawn.
- Weed control requires treatments specific to the type of weeds you may encounter; broadleaf weeds like Dandelion, for example, are best treated in the late fall. Crabgrass is usually best handled by the use of a pre-emergent.
- Which variety?
What kind of grass is the best for you? That depends again on use, climate and soil.
If you’re considering a practice putting green, you might consider a thin-bladed variety. One Florida resident planted a slower growing variety because that state’s prodigious rainfall caused such lush lawn growth that he was forced to mow it two or three times a week. - Check with your landscape designer for suggestions on which kinds of turf do well in your area, but in general, the following grass types do well in the areas listed:
- • Cool season areas are where hardy Bluegrass, Tall Fescue or Perennial Ryegrass work well. That is why they are popular varieties in the upper Midwest and other areas with colder winters. These grasses also grow well in spring and fall’s cooler weather.
- • Sunbelt lawns do better with hardy, hot weather-adapted grasses such as Bermuda, St. Augustine, or Zoysia. These grasses will turn brown in cooler weather, but by over seeding with winter adapted grass varieties you can have a lawn that is green year-round.
- • Western and other dry summer areas are suited to Buffalo grass, Tall Fescue, Bermuda and related varieties that are thicker.
- Lawn Alternatives
As western populations grow and water becomes scarcer, residents may decide that an alternative to a conventional, water-intensive grass lawn is the best choice. Grasses that do well in Seattle may not thrive in Phoenix, where xeriscaping, or low water-adapted landscaping may be preferable to a conventional lawn. Here are some low water use lawn alternatives: - • Plant lawns with low water demand grass varieties.
- • Reduce the square footage of landscape devoted to grassy areas.
- • Increase the relative size of patios and decks.
- • Plant grass areas to accent, not dominate landscaped areas.
- Low water demand lawns and lawn alternatives have added advantages; not only can you cut your water bill, you can reduce the frequency of mowing and fertilizing, even eliminating those tasks altogether.
Sod / Seed
Greener lawns make any landscape more eye catching
Artificial Turf
No Maintenance Lawn using artificial turf
