Vertical Landscaping

Vertical Landscaping Benefits

• Moving your landscape to a vertical orientation has many advantages. It allows more freedom in small spaces than conventional horizontal landscaping. It may even allow you to grow plants that your regular garden wouldn’t support. For instance, if you have a sunny wall in an otherwise-shaded space, you can fill it with light-loving species. Vertical landscaping also allows you to maintain smaller beds and reduces the risk of pests and disease compared to planting in the ground.

Basic Structure

• Basic vertical landscaping requires a growing medium like soil or peat, some sort of vertical structure, and a method of attaching the medium to the vertical surface. Some gardeners use pots or pouches fastened to the vertical surface. Others rely on plastic sheeting, which can be stapled to the surface and filled with soil. In more complex setups, a specialized artificial growing medium such as polyamide felt provides a healthy soil-free environment for plants.

Watering

• All plants need water, but providing it to specimens in a vertical landscape can be difficult. This is why many older vertical gardens relied primarily on succulents and other dry climate plants. Specimens that require more water can still grow in a vertical orientation, however. Large commercial vertical landscaping installations often include custom irrigation systems designed to deliver the right amount of water to each plant. You can install a similar system at home or rely on hand watering. Just remember to treat the plants in your vertical landscape as container plants when you assess their water requirements. The small amount of soil available to each specimen allows the plants to dry out much more quickly than they would in the ground.

Plant Choice

• Not all plants work well in vertical landscapes. It’s important to consider the cultural requirements of each species before you plant, as well as the environment you have available. Washington State University recommends clinging or vining plants. You can also choose slender trees that can be supported by stakes or cages, or small plants such as epiphytes, a nonparasitic plant that grows on another, and succulents.