Out in front

Transform your front garden with low-maintenance plants that look good all year and welcome you home with colour and scent in winter, as Hazel Sillver explains

- Hazel Sillver

AS the first thing you see when you arrive at a house, the front garden sets the tone of the home. It is a valuable space that can be used to make guests feel welcome, create privacy, and provide more shelter and food for wildlife.

However, it's a widely underused area: for example, one in five UK front gardens is almost entirely paved. Such paving requires planning permission in many counties, since it can exacerbate flooding. A simple scheme of low-maintenance planting is a better option and can be a delight all year.

Using evergreens

One of the best plants for a front garden are evergreens. Unlike the main garden, which is predominantly used in summer, the front garden is seen all year. Many evergreens - including Portugal and bay laurel, Euonymus fortunei 'Silver Queen' and Phillyrea latifolia - respond well to clipping, providing verdant structure to show off the house, and you can trim them once a year into boules, lollipops or cones. Evergreens that keep a great shape with minimal or no cutting include mahonia, sarcococca, Pinus mugo and Hebe pinguifolia 'Pagei'. Non-invasive evergreen bamboo Fargesia murielae or F. rufa is another superb choice and can be clipped into a hedge shape.

The front garden is also a great place for plants that perform during the colder months of the year, allowing the main rear garden to be dedicated to plants that flower when we're outdoors in summer. These include hollies with red winter berries, witch hazels that scent the cold air, or cherries that have spring blossom and fiery leaves in autumn.

Blooming out front

If you like to have blooms in the front garden during summer, opt for low-maintenance plants that flower over a long period. A mini gravel garden is a great idea, requiring no weeding and catering for drought-tolerant plants such as lavender and California poppies.