How softscape adds soul to your landscape project
A human body is motionless and meaningless without a soul. It won’t be an overstatement to say the same about your landscape project when we say without a proper softscape design your project will be motionless. Urban Exteriors team of skilled horticultural engineers will create a softscape plan for your project that compliments your hardscape design and will create an outdoor ambiance that comes to life!
Here in the UAE, we are spoiled by the good weather and the wide variety of Succulent plants, Fruit Trees, Different species of Date palm trees and the lush green ground covers to convert the desert soil to a lush green terrain.
Creating the perfect softscape design for project needs an understanding of your hardscape plan and the most critical information we need to gather is your opinion. How would you like to feel when you are outdoors, Do wish to be transported to a resort with an Urban feel or would you rather feel totally disconnected with the city life or would like to experience different color flowers and smells, when you are spending quality time in your outdoors.
Tropical Oasis
One of our client asked us to create a sofscape plan where his project has a tropical beach feel. He had strictly asked us not to use any colored flowers and allowed us to work with plants that have white flowers. We started is sofscape plan with the placement of date palms species Phoenix dactylifera is a flowering plant species in the palm family, Arecaceae, cultivated for its edible sweet fruit. In particular, we used date palm called Khenaizi which if a native date palm in United Arab Emirates another popular date palm we use is called Khalasah which is from Saudi Arabia and itsa dates are called Khlas.
When the softscape parameters were defined by our four-meter clear truck Phoenix dactylifera date palms, we shifted our focus to the tress which will provide a more dense look as we always try the hide the boundary walls to give the house more depth. We then add our favorite Chamaedorea cataractarum, also known as The Cat Palm Tree, the scientific name is very similar to Areca Palm and Kentia Palm. We then find cooler areas to create a collage of similar tress slightly different by planting Archontophoenix palm, Adonidia Merrillii also known as Veitchia or Christmas palm, Archontophoenix Alexandrae and Carpentaria Acuminata.
Once our tall and mediums size tress plan was established we started to focus on a softscape plan phase where all the plant’s Succulents and Shrubs will always be at eye level and we believe will works as our spokesperson constantly to our most prized asset our clients.
We start by identifying the areas where the views will be viable constantly from your indoors areas and by spotlights at night. We have the plants pallet we have to choose from includes Zamia furfuracea or Zamia pumila, also know as coontie palm, Ravenala madagascariensis, commonly known as traveller’s tree or traveller’s palm with a minimum height of three meters, We add some Phoenix roebelenii, with common names of pygmy date palm for its form and shape, Rhapis excelsa also known as broadleaf lady palm in the main areas with spotlights. Once these are populated we then add an accent of green plants with small white flowers that are placed in wind corridors to send in waves of beautiful smell around the sitting areas. The plants we use for this are Angelwing jasmine, Jasminum sambac (the Arabian jasmine),Jasminum Labnani,Jasminum leratii and Jasminum grandiflorum, also known variously as the Spanish jasmine, Royal jasmine, Catalan jasmine.
Soil, Fertilize and Water!
We have to keep in mind the 50-degree heat and no matter how good your plant’s selection is if you are not providing a stable platform for this beautiful species of plants to grow your objective will never mature. Urban Exterior has to carefully study the environment where your garden is, we need to understand the existing soils PH levels and decided if we need to replace the existing soil to break down the acidity and alkalinity in soils to avoid our plants from dying. The optimal pH range for most plants is between 5.5 and 7.0.
When additional fresh sweet soil is required, we get our soil from our farms in Al Ain or Dibba in the United Arab Emirates as this soil from here has ph levels which are extremely friendly for the plants to adapt to and grow. Once our soil is ready we select the fertilizers.
Just like humans cannot survive on water alone, Plants follow the same rule. The fertilizer is the food for plants. The best fertilizers are the ones which break down and improves the structure of soil and withstands the high temperatures, salty ground and high saline water content.
One key element of your fertilizer should be is its ability to hold water and nutrients. Water is an expensive commodity here in the United Arab Emirates. We have to choose a fertilizer which is reliable, natural and sustainable in critical soils it should absorb and store water by preventing it from percolating deep into the ground and always keep it at the rootball level. So your plants can be healthy in all seasons. Give our Skilled Staff a call and lets set up a meeting to discuss your landscape vision.
