Decorative Garden Pathways…

June 9, 2009

Gardening
There are many ways to create an attractive and decorative garden pathway, even when your garden seems a bit small. Pathways have both practical and decorative functions: They designate walking areas around your garden and this helps prevent people from walking straight through your plants, plus they can be designed with a variety of materials in any number of shapes, to enhance the overall look of your yard and garden areas.

How you decide to create your own garden pathways will depend upon your personal tastes and preferences of course, and it’s a good idea to make sure you choose pathway materials which will compliment the exterior design of your home too. Here are some common materials used in garden pathways:

River stones - These are generally smooth stones that come in various sizes, but those used for garden pathways tend to be six inches or more in width or length. They’re buried into the ground slightly and this causes your pathway to look like the bottom of a river bed. This can be quite attractive, particularly when used to create a winding pathway through your garden areas.

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Garden Tip...

Propagating Plants: Take a pan, or dish, at least three inches deep—the circumference of which may be as large as you wish, fill to within one half inch of the top with sand. The cuttings are to be inserted in the sand, which is made very wet, of the consistency of mud. The pan should then be placed on the window case, where it will receive the full light of the sun, which will not injure the cuttings in the least, providing the sand is kept constantly wet, being careful to never allow it to become dry for a moment, otherwise the plants will be lost.

Is there no drainage from the pan necessary? none, the atmosphere will evaporate the water fast enough to prevent any stagnation during the brief time required for the cuttings to take root.

Success in propagating in this way, depends altogether upon keeping the sand wet like mud until the cuttings in it are "struck" or rooted, and this may be easily determined—with the hand gently try to lift the cutting, you will know if it is rooted by the hold maintained on the sand, if not, it will come out. A little experience in feeling with the hand in this way, will enable you to readily determine whether the cutting is rooted or not.
~ James Sheehan
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Concrete moldings - These are quite inexpensive, because you can buy ready made stones, or simply buy a mold and create your own pathway stones from it using concrete. You can usually find molds in different sizes, and with different shapes and designs too. You might decide to create your pathway stones in an octagonal shape for instance, with a butterfly in the center of each.

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Garden Tip...

The earth in vases of plants that stand out in exposed places, will rapidly dry out; if shells or fine gravel is laid over the surface of the soil, they will prevent it from "baking" after watering, and hold the moisture much longer than without. Try it.
~ James Sheehan
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There are many fun things you can do when creating your own garden pathway stones from concrete too. If for instance, you like to stencil or paint, you can paint your own designs on the stones once the concrete has dried.

You can also put something into the bottom of the mold before pouring your concrete, then once the stone is set you’ll have an unusal item at the top of each stone. What you use is of course up to you, but some creative ideas include putting dried flowers into the bottom of the mold, or putting pieces of colored glass or pretty rocks into it instead.

Bricks - This is another popular material to use for creating garden paths, and they tend to be used the most in more formal gardens or with brick houses. Even though the shapes are somewhat too rigid for some people, there are actually many different ways to design an attractive garden path using bricks, without it seeming too stiff and predictable.

You can for instance, get bricks of varying colors and create patterns by the way you arrange them in the garden path layout. You can also lay them out in unusual and creative shapes, and then put fragrant herb plants or flowering ground covers between the spaces that are created from your design.

Bark or Wood chips - This isn’t used for creating garden pathways as often as the other materials mentioned, because it has to be refreshed regularly since wood will decompose over time. But it is a wonderful way to create a naturalized, informal pathway through your garden inexpensively.