Here we have several of photos of different landscaping ideas and themes. In the photo above, the owner created a stone patio accented by a circular garden bed around a tree. As a backdrop, they added a small wall to give it a sense of perimeter and space.

In the one above the owners left the lawn open, green and lush, surrounding the perimeter with the dreamy white picket fence and arbor.

This lawn has been accented with square stones, getting smaller as it extends out into the lawn. The stones are recessed, making for easy mowing and maintenance. You don’t have to worry about them becoming dislodged or chipping.

Here’s another lawn where they used larger stones creating a path and a patio. Notice how they used the 90 degree angles, to avoid a squared, boxed type of feel and look.

See below for more photos and ideas.

Up until a few years ago, I remember going out to my flower bed every year after a long New York winter had passed to find that the flower bed almost always needed a complete over haul.  Meaning, that during the course of late Summer/Early Fall and the Winter, the look, texture, and resilience of the bed had fallen flat. Actually, more like, packed flat from all the snow and ice.

After rearranging or replacing dead plants and flower, the last thing we always had to do was go out and get more mulch for the bed.  I noticed year after year, that within a month, the mulch had faded, been blown away, or had weeds growing up through the black canvas underneath and through the mulch.  Or the weeds us the mulch as soil and grew in it.

We finally decided, that we were going to give stone a try.

Using stone, for us, has saved us a lot of time, money, and energy.

While stone is a little more expensive on the front end – depending on how much and how often you had to replenish your mulch, it should pay for itself within the first two or three years.  For us, if I remember correctly, the cost of mulch vs. using stone was not that much different.  Ordering it by the yard, ended up giving us a lot more than we needed, so we used the rest in areas that we had always planned on doing.

Advantages of Stones:

Only have to be placed once

Won’t blow away

Can be easily maintained, transferred

Multiple colors, shapes, and sizes

Advantages of Mulch:

Cheap

Biodegradable

Easy to transport