Designing a cottage, or intended for permanent residence, building plot is not an easy task. This is a serious process that requires an integrated systems approach and carefully thought-out solutions. It is not enough just to have a plot of land and finances for the improvement and construction of the house, and a flowerbed broken in front of the entrance can hardly be called an example of landscape design. In order to correctly and efficiently use even a small space, you need to know about some of the subtleties of the layout, one of which is zoning.

What is the functional zoning of the site

The division of the site into zones intended for various purposes can be compared with the layout of the apartment: the entrance hall is separated from the services (bathroom and toilet), kitchen and living quarters. The latter, in turn, are divided into a bedroom and a living room. In addition, from the bedroom you can get to the loggia - a summer relaxation area.

Approximately by the same principle the territory of a summer residence or a residential estate should be divided. Such zoning avoids domestic difficultiesthat could arise in the case of an unsystematic location of residential and utility structures, plants, places for recreation. In addition, the division avoids the appearance of excess garbage and discomfort associated with domestic circumstances.

For example: you ordered delivery of firewood or manure. A truck arrived with your order. In the event that zoning is not thought out, you will have to dump the cargo before the main entrance to the site, and then transport it all with a wheelbarrow through the entire yard to a poorly accessible place located behind the house. This will leave a lot of garbage that will have to be cleaned, and you will spend unnecessary physical effort.

With a properly thought-out layout, the hozzone of your site will be prudently separated from the rest of the territory and equipped with a separate entrance. You just have to tell the truck driver where to dump the manure and firewood. In this case, the front area of ​​your hacienda will remain clean.

In a well-designed area, everything should be logical and convenient: the simplest example is a bed with herbs, located next to the barbecue gazebo or summer kitchen.

Did you know? Emperor Claudius Caesar, who lived from 10 BC. e. 54 g. e., very fond of growing roses and caring for his garden. He spent 4-5 hours daily on this hobby.

Site Planning Rules

Before proceeding with the planning of the site, you should carefully consider the future project, adhering to the following rules:

1. It is desirable that the house is in the highest place. Firstly, it creates a good overview and provides access to sunlight. Secondly, there is less likelihood of flooding during spring floods. If your hacienda is located on a flat, flat surface, you can skip this point, otherwise try to follow this advice.
2. Find out the level of groundwater location, this will help you correctly place the plants.
3. Consider the winds characteristic of your region, especially during the cold season. Most often, the north wind presents a danger, so it would be advisable to create from this side a dense hedge of tall trees or shrubs. Taking into account the direction of the winds, the dwelling should also be oriented - it is desirable that the sleeping room and the veranda are protected from drafts.
4. Buildings are best placed on the short side of a rectangular piece of land - this externally increases the space.
5. A bright flower garden, located in the center of the rectangular section, visually increases it.
6. If you want to equip a quiet cozy courtyard, sheltered from neighbors and invisible from the street, the house should be built closer to the central zone of the site, and the entrance to it will be from the yard.
7. The best direction of the bedroom windows is west and east.
8. A recreation area (a barbecue gazebo, a canopy or just benches), it is advisable to place it in the depths of the site, away from the street. If this location is also intended for frequent eating (like a summer dining room), it is better to place it near the living room.
9. It is not necessary to build economic services in the lowland itself - during rains it will be quite difficult to get there and not get dirty.

Location of zones

Before proceeding with the planning, you should carefully examine the territory and imagine it divided into zones. Try to visually draw in front of you the future house, garden, garden, front part and relaxation area.

Important! Arches, bridges, small arbors, located closer to the edges of the garden, visually increase its area.

You should take this procedure very seriously, because at the stage of arranging the site it will be difficult to change something. After all, it will not work just to transfer one zone to another place - in a limited territory, a change in the functional purpose of any one zone will necessarily entail the same metamorphoses with another piece of land.

Simply put, if you decide to move the flower garden, it will need to be broken down where the original project had a gazebo (relaxation area), or outbuildings.

Drawing up a drawing

Before making a drawing, you can take a plan of your site in the BTI (if it is complex), or draw your own contours on graph paper. The scale can be 1: 100, or 1:50.

The drawing is done in this way:

1. First you need to outline the site plan (scale 1: 100) into squares with a side of 1 cm, corresponding to 1 m in real measurement (for a scale of 1:50, squares should have a side of 2 cm).
2. Based on the fact that on the plan 1 cm is 1 meter, cut out figures from colored paper - projections from above the house, garage, outbuildings, flower garden, vegetable garden, shrubs and trees, etc.
3. Mentally imagine your site divided into zones: guest, residential, utility. And also - flower beds, beds and shrubs, a recreation area and a sports ground, a bathhouse and a garage.
4. Consider how the zoning will be done.
5. Moving the figures according to the layout of the site, arrange them so that you like the layout, and at the same time it would be functional.
6. When placing the figures on the plan, consider the direction of the winds, the occurrence of groundwater, the orientation to the cardinal points, access roads.

All the same can be done using a computer, owning landscape applications (Garden Planner, X-Designer, Our Garden, SketchUp, etc.).

As a result, you should have a project in which the following elements will be taken into account, with a description of their detailed descriptions:

• the location of all buildings (residential and utility);
• a detailed step-by-step plan for landscaping the estate;
• location of garden paths and the material from which they are made;
• drainage system (if there is a need for it);
• lighting devices and their location;
• reservoirs and pools (if any);
• costing of materials and work.

Entrance A-Zone: main gate, parking lot, coniferous garden, flower garden. B- Utility zone: household plot, garden, bathhouse with terrace, shower, toilet and pantry. B- Residential area: house, terrace, flower garden and ground cover. G- Landscape area: a game meadow, a decorative pond, a rock garden, a bridge, a resting place in the shade, a barbecue area.

Style selection

In the matter of choosing a design style, for the flight of your imagination the widest scope opens. You can realize your own ideas by resorting to some specific popular style, for example:

• Mauritanian;
• English;
• colonial;
• Japanese;
• Alpine;
• country;
• Russian village;
• high tech;
• minimalism;
• cottage etc.

You can try to combine several directions. A similar solution can be useful on a site with certain terrain features. For example, if there is a natural hill, it is not necessary to cut it off - there you can equip a rock garden, and sell the living part in a different way.

The choice of a particular style depends on your personal preferences., fortunately, now there is a lot of accessible and detailed information about any direction of design. You can easily use it and realize your ideas.

Did you know? In pre-Petrine times, in Russia, arbors were called attics. It is known that in 1680 Tsar Fedor Alekseevich Romanov arranged in the palacem garden "decorated carved attic."

What zones can a site consist of

The following is a description of the main areas of the land. Perhaps you do not need some of them, but you would like to equip something that is not indicated here - for example, a large part will be occupied by a garden and a bathhouse. Everything is in your hands, the locations presented are just an example.

Entrance or front area

This is a kind of facade of your site, its outer side, designed to receive guests. If we hold associations with an apartment building of an old building, we can say that this is a front door. Naturally, this area should look good, and it is desirable that it be viewed from all sides at the entrance to the house. To do this, it is better to avoid high capital fences and gates, an easy openwork fence and the same wicket will be enough.

The plant component is an integral part of the front zone. In which stylistic decision to green this location - depends on your personal preferences and the size of the site. Even a limited area can be beautifully decorated with plants in containers. They are placed along the path, and with the advent of cold weather they are brought into a warm room.

The following layout is considered a classic option.: There is a parking area behind the entry gate, possibly with a canopy. Sometimes, in the presence of sufficient space and funds, an almost full-fledged garage is built (naturally, unheated, just walls with a roof and floor). From the parking area to the house is a path paved with stone or tile. This is not a garden path, but rather a narrow alley framed by flower borders or a green hedge. Shrubs can protect the site and from the side of the street.

Perhaps the most popular decoration elements in this area are the front gardens. They can be made in different styles, but the general concept looks something like this: medium-sized shrubs with foliage and flowers of different colors (red, yellow, green) combined with decorative trees (dwarf, stamped and weeping) and perennials (crocuses, mukkari , daffodils, tulips, irises, etc.).

Rest zone

This can be a covered or open terrace, a kind of chillout with garden furniture, a gazebo, a small patio with barbecue facilities, etc. This platform is designed for relaxing, meeting friends, just having a good time. This can be an alpine chalet arbor, a construction with a canopy in the Moorish style, or simply comfortably located comfortable benches in a picturesque frame of greenery.

The relaxation corner is usually broken away from the facade of the site. This should be a quiet cozy place where you can relax in the company of friends, or arrange an afternoon fiesta. A good option is a remote corner of the garden, in the shade of fruit trees and tall bushes (lilac, hydrangea, euonymus, barberry, etc.). On average, a recreation site takes up 10 to 15% of the total area.

Economic zone

Usually this is the location where the outdoor shower is located, possibly a bathhouse, outbuildings (sheds, poultry house, etc.), a garage, a wood or coal barn, a compost pit, etc. Before equipping this place, it is necessary to carefully study the possible access roads to the site. It should be taken into account the possibility of delivering firewood, coal, manure, building materials, etc. in such a way as to do this not through the front (guest) entrance, but from the back yard.

This territory can be easily separated from the rest of the plot using various devices: trellises with grapes, ivy or other climbing plants on trellises, decorative wattle-trees, etc.

Garden

Often, even in that garden, where the emphasis is on ornamental plants, you can find several fruit trees and a bed of herbs. Alpine forbs, for example, are an integral part of rock gardens or rockeries. On any site you can find a place for planting several berry bushes, or tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers.

Important! The garden plot should be well lit by the sun, but at the same time it is desirable that tall trees cover it from the north winds.

Flower beds

This is the decoration of the entire site, capable of giving it a unique charm. With skillful organization, a beautiful, memorable flower garden can be broken even in a small area. And vice versa: you can uselessly use a large area, which not only does not give a highlight to the territory, but even spoils the overall impression.

Choosing a place under the flower garden, should take into account the needs of all plants that will be planted there. This applies to illumination by the sun's rays, the compatibility of plants, the timing of flowering. You can choose plants that, in turn, will delight you and your guests with their color, starting in April and ending in October.

For example, adonises, hyacinths, crocuses, daffodils, tulips bloom in spring. Throughout the summer: pansies, English roses, armerias, cornflowers, gladioli, flax, clematis, bells. In autumn, you can enjoy Japanese anemones, aconite, vernoniums, tricirtis, chrysanthemums, etc.

A flowerbed will look great, in the center of which a juniper stands surrounded by mock-up, peonies, mountain pug Pug. Closer to the outer edge there are lilies, fragrant tobacco, medium juniper, David's buddy, and plantain hosts. And along the perimeter of the flower garden the smallest ones will grow - creeping thyme, primrose, Meyer lilac, monard, lavender, irises, fragrant violet, horizontal juniper. In this combination, the magnitude, color of greens and flowers, the shape, aroma and general appearance of the plants are harmoniously combined.

The flower garden may be as follows:

• circular island;
• modular;
• curb;
• tape;
• discount;
• mixborder;
• stalls;
• landscape.

On the slopes, hills and terraces you can plant flowers in the form of rockeries or rock gardens.

The flower bed can combine dry streams, hedges, succulent balls and much more. In addition, it is not necessary to limit yourself to a strict framework of styles. Try to show your own creative abilities by creating a flowerbed in accordance with your ideas and preferenceswithout sticking to strict labels of specific styles. The main thing - try to avoid excessive sloppiness. And who knows - perhaps you will come up with something new, original style, which will become a trend first among your friends and acquaintances, then in a holiday village and so on.

Sports and playgrounds

The size and configuration of the site depends on the total area of ​​the site and the preferences of the owners. If there is enough space, it can even be a small football field. A much smaller area is required to install one basketball backboard or one soccer goal.

You can install there a crossbar, parallel bars, sunbed, or a small simulator for athletics. For such sports procedures (workout), a minimum area is required, and equipment can be located in the depths of the garden, among the trees. Indeed, for sports, a person needs a sufficient amount of oxygen.A ping-pong table will also take up relatively little space, but it is advisable (though not necessary) to make a canopy.

Did you know? The word "casino" comes from the Italian expression casino, literally meaning "house". Originally it was called a gazebo or a small building in the garden, where you could relax, chatting or listening to music, and only centuries later it became the name of the gambling establishment.

Methods for visual division of the site

There are quite a few options for dividing the site into separate locations. This can be clearly delineated in one way or another border (paths, hedges, pergolas, etc.), or rather conditional restrictions (height differences). The following are the main varieties.

Hedges

Perhaps the most popular zoning method. is he distinguished by functionality, versatility and beauty. There is no need to install a fence made of wood or metal, because you can grow a beautiful green wall of the right height, fully consistent with the concept of the entire site or a separate zone.

From a huge variety of species, you can choose plants that are ideal for your site. It can be conifers (thuja, cypress), fruit shrubs (currants, gooseberries, sea buckthorn), or perennials, such as lilac, hydrangea, euonymus, cotoneaster, jasmine, etc.

A fence of this type is often separated from the residential area and the rest of the territory. Thus, using tall shrubs such as juniper, sakura, hawthorn, felt cherry, it is possible to isolate the associated structures from the rest of the site. Create a kind of impenetrable wall of green spaces.

Decorative height differences

Great solution for a slope plot. Zones can be divided using horizontal terraces located at different levels and bearing different functional loads.

For example, if the site has a rectangular shape and goes down to the pond with the long side, it can be zoned in approximately this way: at the very top, by the road, there is a guest area; nearby, at the same level - the house, on the side - a flower garden. The terrace, located just below, is occupied by outbuildings.. Alternatively, they can also be separated by hedges. Nearby there is a small garden, below - a recreation area surrounded by fruit trees.

At the very bottom, not far from the reservoir there is a small sports ground, you can put football goals there in a single copy. Terraces are interconnected by ladders, single-level zones for various purposes are separated by paths or dry streams.

Zoning with gabion structures

An original, but not yet very popular method. Gabion is a metal mesh box that is covered with stone. You can choose stones of suitable color and texture. This method of fencing is quite budgetary. In addition, its advantage is the fact that, despite the massive structure, it is not capital - if necessary, it can be dismantled.

On the wireframe mesh, you can let climbers. In this case, it will be possible to achieve the effect of a hedge when only a green wall is visible, and not its stone-mesh base.

Track surveying

It is probably the simplest and most functional way of delimiting the location of a site. In addition, this is the most traditional method used by our grandmothers in the villages. Summer residents on their six hundredths also resorted to it several dozen years ago.

Important! Winding garden paths visually make the site larger.

The universality and simplicity of the method makes it possible to connect all zones together, with each of them being clearly separated from the neighboring. If everything is done logically and correctly, even for the first time a guest at your dacha will understand where the shower and toilet are located, and where there is a gazebo for rest and raspberry bushes.

In this case, you will not need to establish or grow hedges - it is enough to correctly divide the site into functional zones, and to lay paths between them (tiled, stone, bulk, etc.). Some locations can be divided using dry streams.

Pergolas and fences

Pergola - trellised canopy or covered passage covered with climbing plants. It protects from the bright sun and gives the area an original look. The fence can be simple, like a plank fence, but it can also be a more complex structure, made of carved wood or forged metal. Since the purpose of such elements is purely decorative, here you have a wide scope for creativity.

In addition to these fences, arches, trellises, trellises can also be attributed to this.. Such structures can have an elegant design, attracting attention with exquisite openwork carvings or beautiful wood structure. And you can equip these hedges and in such a way that they are almost invisible. In this case, they will be only a support for climbing plants (ivy, grapes, morning glory, quamoclite, mammordica, honeysuckle, Chinese magnolia vine, clematis, etc.).

Remember that a competent and logically verified breakdown into zones will help you get the most out of even the smallest allotment of land. In addition, a correctly performed procedure is able to visually enlarge such a site. In addition, zoning will not only help you relax with comfort and coziness, but also facilitate the work necessary on a suburban area.