Mixborder — ready-made schemes, selection of plants and instructions for creating with your own hands (90 photos)

Is it difficult to create a mixborder with your own hands, how to choose its color scheme, where to place a flower garden and how to take care of it – questions that can stump a novice gardener. We are happy to help you find the answer to your questions.

In modern landscape design, a mixborder is called a flower garden of various plant species planted in groups, having an oblong shape.

When creating mixborders, they most often try to use perennial plants, sometimes diluted with annuals. Coniferous and deciduous trees and shrubs, a variety of lianas are also sometimes used.

Rockery is a landscape composition with a predominance of stones. Stones here play a dominant role, plants go to a secondary plan, they only shade, create visible accents.
Unlike the rock garden, which is usually erected on a hill, the rock garden can be located both on flat terrain and terraces.

Watch the video: Mixborders of perennial flowers and conifers

The mixborder can be used as dividers of the park zone into sectors, they can decorate the entrance to the garden, make a slope decor, arrange a garden path.

There are two types of mixborders: those that can be viewed from all sides, and those that are designed for one-sided decoration.

Mixborders styles

Lugovoy. Reflects the romance of the mountain and meadow landscape. Meadow grasses and a variety of cereals are used in their creation.

English. There is a strict style in the design. Clarity of lines, rigor of forms and restraint of colors are the main features of such a flower garden.

Rustic. The variety of bright color shades, the splendor of flowering, the assortment of plants consists mainly of local crops.

Vegetable. Create a mixborder design from various vegetable crops, choosing the color of leaves and flowers. It also has a functional value, because in autumn gardeners can collect their bonus – a harvest of vegetables.

Color design

It is important for a novice gardener to choose the right color scheme of plants. Having considered numerous photos of mixborders, you can choose for yourself the most acceptable color design option that will match your desires and tastes. It is important not to overdo it with a variety of shades, harmoniously place the color spots.

For a harmonious combination of color shades, it is advisable to choose no more than 4-5 colors. A color chromatic circle can help a novice designer in choosing shades. Using it, it is easy to determine the contrast of colors and their compatibility.

To create the most harmonious composition, mix warm shades of colors with warm ones, and cold colors with cold ones.

Mixborder placement

First of all, you need to choose a place for the future flower garden. It should meet the purpose of the mixborder – to decorate the edge of the terrace, create a natural fence around the perimeter of the garden, decorate garden paths or be located along the wall of the house. The ideal place for such a flower garden is a plot where both light and shadow are present in equal amounts.

When choosing a plot, it is necessary to take into account the length of the future flower garden, the existing restrictions – the height of the windows, the distance from the viewing point, the distance between the track and the mixborder.

A place for a flower garden should have an acceptable level of humidity, sufficient light and shade, as well as sufficient soil fertility.

The design of the mixborder should be created in accordance with the basic style of the garden in which you are going to place it.

Creating a mixborder

First of all, you need to draw a mixborder diagram, taking into account the characteristic features of such flower beds. There are several rules for creating mixborders.

Height of plants. So that the upper part of the flower garden is not lost during the review, arrange the flower garden so that the height of the tallest plant does not exceed half the distance from the viewing point to the flower garden.

A clear border of the mixborder. To achieve clear boundaries, use colored stone chips or tree saws, you can also use paving slabs or beautiful stones. You can plant a border of perennial stunted plants.

Plant plants, remembering their height in adult form. Plant high ones closer to the center, low ones – closer to the edge of the flower garden.

Don't overdo it with the abundance of different plant species. It is better to use 3-4 decorative species than to create excessive spotting.

When planning a mixborder, give up too smooth strict lines. The flower garden looks more elegant, smoothly bending in natural beauty.

How to choose the right plants

When selecting plants, it is necessary to take into account the type of mixborder. It depends on whether you want to create a contrasting color scheme. There is a polychrome (in which several different colors are used), or a monochrome mixborder (created from several shades of the same color).

To create a mixborder of perennials, take into account the space on which the plants will grow in adult form. It is not necessary to plant perennials tightly, but rather supplement the voids with annuals that will temporarily fill the empty spaces.

Starting from the highest in the center of the flower garden, plant the plants in tiers. You can use irises, astilba, phlox, daylilies, cereals – grasshopper, maned barley, ozhika. Add piquancy to geraniums, echinacea, coreopsis, lobelia.

Choose plants that will give the flower garden a natural naturalness, naturally fit into the design and decorate your mixborder. Do not forget about the green background, on which flowering plants will look advantageous. As greenery, use hosts, cineraria, geyhera.

For the lower tier of such a flower garden, you can use verbena, alissums, ochitki, phlox awl, thyme, nivyanik, lobelia or petunia, and many bulbous crocuses, snowdrops, dwarf tulips are also suitable.

When creating a mixborder of shrubs, place the tallest plants in the background. The middle tier can be made up of flowering shrubs: Japanese spirea, Japanese henomeles, forsythia, elderberry, chubushnik, and also beautifully decorate the mixborder shrubs with decorative foliage – dogwood, white turf, barberry.

The lower tier will be decorated with creeping plants – Cossack juniper, different types of ivy, creeping types of dogwood.

A coniferous mixborder can be created using dwarf species of pine, spruce, fir, spherical or cone-shaped thuja for the middle tier, which lend themselves well to pruning. For the lower tier, choose creeping conifers – Cossack juniper, cedar elfin, Japanese tufted.

The rose mixborder looks unusually regal, but requires special care. Roses need pruning, so plan a flower garden of such a size that you can reach the most distant plants.

For the winter, roses need to be covered, protecting them from freezing. To do this, you need to provide a shelter system. You can use metal arcs covered with film or spunbond.

How to take care of a mixborder

Rules for the care of a ready-made mixborder:

• Ensure watering on time.
• Weed the weeds in a timely manner.
• Sometimes add fertilizers to watering, both mineral and organic preparations. This will increase the vitality of plants, add beauty to flowering and resistance to diseases.
• To shelter heat-loving plants from frost.
• To carry out sanitary, therapeutic and rejuvenating pruning in time.
• Take timely measures to combat diseases and pests.

Guided by these rules for creating and caring for a mixborder, you can not only decorate your garden with a floral miracle, but also surprise your friends with the beauty of ornamental plants in your flower garden.

Photo of the mixborder