Start with a design consultation:
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Luxury backyard patio in Newton, MA with modern outdoor furniture, warm landscape lighting, and lush privacy hedges.

When the sun goes down, your outdoor living space doesn’t have to disappear into darkness. Professionally designed landscape lighting transforms your property into a warm, welcoming, and functional extension of your home—enhancing both beauty and value. Whether you live in Newton, Needham, Wellesley, Weston, Wayland, Westwood, Walpole, Dedham, Norwood, or anywhere in Norfolk County and the southwest Boston metro area, outdoor lighting offers benefits that go far beyond simply helping you see at night.

Highlight Your Home’s Best Features

Landscape lighting is the finishing touch that brings your property’s architecture and landscaping to life after sunset. Strategic placement of path lights, uplights, and accent lighting draws the eye to:

• Architectural details like stonework, columns, and trim

• Landscape features including ornamental trees, garden beds, and water features

• Outdoor living spaces such as patios, pergolas, and fire pits

For example, a Wellesley home with elegant front columns can be transformed with uplighting that makes the entryway stand out. In Newton, a backyard koi pond can shimmer under soft, low-voltage lighting. These touches make your home look high-end and well cared for—day or night.

Extend Your Outdoor Living Hours

One of the biggest advantages of professional outdoor lighting is the ability to enjoy your yard well past sunset. Imagine:

• Hosting dinner on the patio in Needham under a soft glow

• Relaxing by the fire pit in Westwood late into the evening

• Taking a peaceful stroll through a lit garden in Wayland

With proper design, outdoor lighting eliminates dark, unused corners and creates a comfortable, inviting atmosphere for both entertaining and quiet family time. The right lighting makes your yard feel like an extension of your living room—perfect for every season in New England.

A High-ROI Upgrade That Increases Home Value

Outdoor lighting is more than a style upgrade—it’s a smart investment. Industry research shows that professionally installed landscape lighting can increase a home’s perceived value by up to 15%. In competitive real estate markets like Newton, Needham, and Wellesley, a well-lit property stands out from the rest.

Potential buyers see a home that is both beautiful and secure, and they often associate outdoor lighting with high-quality maintenance and luxury living. In many cases, the cost of installation can be recouped—and even surpassed—when it’s time to sell.

Boost Curb Appeal and Safety

From a curb appeal standpoint, warm, layered lighting instantly elevates your property’s appearance. Even modest homes look elegant and upscale when illuminated correctly.

From a safety perspective, lighting is equally important:

• Walkway lights prevent trips and falls

• Driveway lights guide cars safely at night

• Motion-activated lighting deters unwanted visitors

• Well-lit entries increase security and peace of mind

For homeowners in Norfolk County and Boston suburbs, this combination of beauty and safety is a win-win.

Low-Maintenance, Energy-Efficient Lighting

Today’s LED outdoor lighting systems are built to last. Compared to traditional halogen bulbs, LEDs:

• Use up to 80% less energy

• Last 10+ years before needing replacement

• Produce less heat, making them safer and more eco-friendly

Paired with smart lighting controls—including timers, dimmers, and app-based systems—you can create the perfect ambiance while keeping costs low.

Why Work With Land Design Associates

At Land Design Associates, we design and install custom outdoor lighting tailored to your home’s architecture, landscape, and lifestyle. Our team handles everything—from concept to installation—ensuring a seamless process and results that make your property shine year-round.

We proudly serve homeowners in Newton, Needham, Wellesley, Weston, Wayland, Westwood, Walpole, Dedham, Norwood, Norfolk County, and the southwest Boston metro area. Whether you’re looking to subtly enhance your garden or create a dramatic nighttime transformation, we can make it happen.

Ready to Transform Your Property After Dark?

A well-designed landscape lighting system does more than illuminate—it adds value, beauty, and functionality to your home.

Call Land Design Associates today to schedule your free outdoor lighting consultation and see how we can make your property shine.

View our portfolio: https://landdesignassociates.com/featured-projects/

As the leaves begin to change and the air turns crisp, there’s no better time to consider the benefits of planting trees in the fall. We’re passionate about the environment and want to share with you why autumn is the ideal season for tree planting.

1. Strong Root Growth: During the fall, the soil is still warm from the summer months, while the air is cooler. This unique combination encourages robust root growth. Trees planted in the fall have several months to establish their roots before the heat of summer or the harsh winter cold sets in, giving them a head start for a healthier, longer life.
2. Water Conservation: Fall typically brings more rainfall, reducing the need for excessive watering. This not only saves you time and money but also promotes eco-friendly practices by conserving water resources.
3. Less Stress on Trees: Trees experience less stress when planted in the fall. Cooler temperatures reduce the risk of transplant shock, allowing your newly planted trees to acclimate gradually to their new environment.
4. Fall Foliage: Fall offers the added bonus of stunning foliage. Imagine the vibrant colors of your new trees enhancing your landscape as they transform with the season, providing beauty year after year.
5. Environmental Impact: Trees play a vital role in combating climate change. By planting trees now, you’re contributing to a greener, healthier planet for future generations. Plus, they provide habitat for wildlife and improve air quality.

At Land Design Associates, we’re here to make your tree-planting experience effortless. Whether you’re a homeowner, business owner, or a community organizer, our expert team is ready to assist you with the right tree selection, planting advice, and the highest quality trees available. Take advantage of this perfect season to invest in the environment, your property, and your community. Together, let’s make a positive impact by planting trees this fall.

When choosing a landscape firm to partner with, there are a number of factors to consider. Often times the cost of an outdoor landscape project is similar to doing a new kitchen or family room. There are many factors that go into the design, building, and maintenance of your new investment. By hiring an experienced contractor, you can be assured that all the aspects of the design and installation have been considered. Who wants to get to the end of a project and find out that the contractor has missed crucial steps in the process or not installed things according to proper standards? This often happens when inexperienced and “budget” contractors are chosen, leading to frustration, costly re-work and possibly legal action. Who needs that! Follow these recommendations to ensure your project is done right and the only hassle you have is carrying all the food out to your new grill area for your first neighborhood barbecue.

The Value of a Trained Designer

The first step in any building process is to sift through all the possibilities and make the best outdoor spaces possible. Here is where a trained designer is worth their weight in gold. By putting your ideas down on paper and combining them with new ideas, the project can easily be thought through in terms of space utilization, flow, visual elements and material selection. Don’t settle for a contractor who draws an illegible sketch on a napkin or who tells you how your yard renovation will look using a lot of arm-waving and gesturing. Let’s face it. The process is very abstract taking concepts from ideas to reality. We recommend hiring a company who can give you colored drawings that you can easily understand and use to visualize the finished product. The major benefit to drawing out all ideas on paper is that you can change your mind easily and also let one idea lead to the creation of another. The client can “try on” different designs and let them percolate over time eliminating the awful potential of being at the end of the project and saying “I wish I had thought of that BEFORE the job was complete.” The landscape design, to quote Frank Lloyd Wright, “Is the cheapest but most important part of the job.”

Do Subcontractors do the Installation Work?

If you have ever had any construction work done at your house, you know the delay game. The general contractor explains his delays and the fact that there is no one working on the site that week as “waiting for subcontractors.” This often drags out the project and can create installation quality problems due to the finger-pointing of mistakes and miscommunication.
It’s much better to hire a company that can do all the work in house. That way there is no subcontractor excuse game being played. A high-quality landscape firm should be able to do all the grading, walls, patios, lights, irrigation, plants and fences themselves. It is usually the case and is perfectly fine that these companies sub out asphalt driveways and large tree removal.

How the Installation Process Unfolds is Crucial for a Great Outcome

Make sure that the landscape company that you hire has a site foreman or project manager that is communicative and asks a lot of questions during the installation process.  Make sure the designer doesn’t disappear and is on-site regularly to guide the installer and to handle any issues that may arise. Communication with you the homeowner is critical all along the way.  The lack of keeping you in the loop often leads to rework and potential conflict.

A major root problem in most construction projects is poor communication on the part of the contractor.  Our approach is the opposite of most contractors who prefer that the client is not involved. We, on the other hand, love keeping the client involved, our foremen are strong communicators that engage with clients proactively when unexpected changes must be made.

Choose Experience: It Matters

Find out how many years the company has been in business and how much experience the designer, project manager, and foreman have.  Also, did they go to school for landscape design and construction? Or are they inexperienced and lacking fundamental construction knowledge.  The worst thing is to entrust your

expensive landscape project to a poser who does not know or care to do things the right way. Experience matters. Seek it out when deciding on who to work with. 

Is Your Contractor Insured?

Usually, an established company will have two points covered in the insurance area. Firstly, they will have an overabundance of insurance coverage for property damage or worker injury. Secondly, a good company will never have to use its insurance because it is a well run and safe company. Often times small “Truck and Shovel” companies or people just starting out in the business will not have insurance. The problem with this is that if there is an accident on your property, you and your insurance company will have to pay not the contractor who will usually disappear and not answer their phone.
So remember to ask all these questions if you live in Norwood, Westwood, Needham, Canton, Newton, Weston, or Wellesley and are looking to do a landscape renovation project.

“Land Design Associates was very professional and their labor crew highly skilled. They provided exceptional advice and created a landscape design based on our vision. The management team was patient and very helpful as we made numerous changes prior to the final drawings. I highly recommend Land Design Associates and their great crew to any potential client.” – Homeowner

Looking to Upgrade your Outdoor Space in the Greater Boston Area with a New Landscape Design?

If you want to stun your family and friends and truly fall in love with spending time outside in your own backyard, come talk to us. We’ve been providing landscaping services to Westwood, Norfolk County, and southern Middlesex County for over 25 years, and we’re proud of what we do.

How to Take Care of Your Evergreens for Landscaping

Protecting Plants for Winter

New England’s harsh winters can wreak havoc on your evergreen trees and shrubs if you’re not careful. Even though evergreens can survive through the winter months, cold temperatures, high winds and a winter sun can dry out evergreen foliage, damage bark and, if severe enough, even injure or kill branches and roots.

Protecting your evergreens during the winter can mitigate the damage and make for a prosperous spring. When you’re landscaping your yard and taking care of evergreens, you want your trees and shrubs to be an investment.

It takes a little time and planning in colder zones as in ours, so make sure that your fall maintenance schedule includes time for plant protection.

Here are five tips to protect your evergreens during the winter.

Apply Winter Mulch

During the winter, mulching landscape evergreen shrubs insulates the soil and roots.

Mulch maintains a steady soil temperature to prevent temperature extremes because it acts as an insulating blanket. Bare ground in winter causes temperature fluctuations that can force plants out of the ground exposing the roots. A warm spell can also do more damage by forcing plants out of dormancy triggering new growth that will ten be damaged as soon as temperatures plummet again.

Check susceptible plants after the first hard frost in fall to apply winter mulch. Applying too early, before the plant is dormant, may damage the plant.

Spray Anti-Desiccants

Anti-desiccants, also known as anti-transpirants, are landscaping sprays that supply protective coatings to evergreens during the winter months. Spray an anti-desiccant product to reduce moisture loss on evergreens.

When the ground freezes, plants are unable to absorb moisture so they take moisture from their foliage, causing it to dry out. This can damage or kill your beloved rhododendrons, andromeda, hollies and more.

When sprayed on the evergreen foliage, anti-desiccants hold in the moisture during winter. They provide a protective coating on the foliage to reduce the water that escapes.

An application in November and again in January should protect them for the entire season. 

Water Your Landscape Evergreens

It might sound counterintuitive, but watering your evergreens during winter in between snowfalls will provide them with needed moisture to prevent desiccation and add insulating protection.

This is especially true during those sunny winter days that we’re sometimes accustomed to in New England thanks to our dry winters. Evergreens, after all, die not because of freezing but because of a lack of humidity.

As for leaving the work to snow? Snow insulates plants and regulates ground temperature. Don’t be afraid to shovel some extra snow on your shrubs but take care not to break them!

Wrap Your Shrubs

Wrapping shrubs creates a wind barrier and traps some warmth.

Use a porous material, such as burlap or sheets. There are many benefits to wrapping prized evergreens, including protection from deer damage, salt damage, ice damage and sun damage.

Tie up your shrubs that have a tendency to split from the weight of snow with twine. Evergreens such as arborvitaes sometime split down the middle and this damage is irreversible. Deciduous plants will typically recover, but some evergreens will not regrow from the damaged area.

Wrap Your Trees

Wrapping your landscape trees also offers some great winter protection in order to protect bark from sunscald.

Sunscald is a condition whereby tree bark on deciduous trees is damaged and frozen following periods of high temperatures during the winter season. On cold winter days, the sun heats the bark to stimulate growth. When a cloud or other obstacle suddenly blocks the sun, the temperature quickly drops, killing the active tissue.

Signs of sunscald include deep fissures, cracking dead bark and sunken areas. You can protect your trees by wrapping them with a commercial tree wrap designed for this use. Use white or another light color, never black or brown as they will absorb too much heat.

Thinking About a Yard Upgrade?

If you want to maintain your landscape properly for the winter and get a head start on spring landscape planning, chat with us. We’ve been helping families in south Boston create and maintain beautiful landscapes for over 25 years, so we know a thing or two.

Planning a New Backyard Patio Design

Sometimes, all it takes is a creative design and a little hardscaping with a patio wall to liven up your backyard without breaking the bank.

In the spring, we met with a family who wanted to enhance their back patio paver area of their property and create a more aesthetically pleasing and connected space without bankrolling their retirement plan.

So how did we do it? It all starts with planning and consultation.

We met the family at their home to identify the lay of the land, highlight key areas and take measurements and photos. Asked how we would create a larger paver patio to accommodate more guests, design a smooth transition from the existing space to the nearby lawn and build a natural seating area through hardscape in the form of a wall, our team set to work!

Designing a New Patio Hardscape For Style and Comfort

Our design team drafted various landscape paver plans that offered different styles to reach the same solution.

Once we presented the landscape plans to the family and a decision was made, we moved on to finalizing the design. At Landscape Design, we identify items such as materials for our builders, carefully select and curate plants and set a schedule date for installation as part of the process for developing a landscape design from concept to completion.

For paver materials, we even invited the homeowners to join us at local stone yards and masonry-supply shops in Greater Boston to help them choose which landscape stone or landscape paver they wanted to see on their property. Net, we move on to project preparation and installation.

How We Bring a Hardscape Design to Life  

For any landscaping project to run smoothly, staying well-organized from the beginning is essential for ensuring that the work is done on time and creates space for handling any issues that come up along the way.

Our landscape designers equipped our hardscapers will a thoroughly dimensioned plan so that they could lay out sprayed lines to identity important parameters. The crew began their work by removing the existing hardscape and stringing a line to points for key items such as the wall and patio edges.

Because of the varying heights between the patio area and the lawn, we installed hardscape steps to guarantee a pleasing transition between the two planes.

With a strong base set, our crew began to build the rotunda-like wall with block pavers. Block pavers are a hardscape material that resemble natural stone on the exterior surface but feature a pierced shape on its interior to accommodate affordable and easy installation.

After constructing the wall, we finished off by laying the new hardscape paver patio, and when the job is complete, we clean the backyard area and repair any tidy up the lawn.

The homeowners  were extremely happy with the final result. We handled all of their design requests to create a stunning space and we’re excited to show you the before-and-after photos.

Want to Show Off Your New Backyard Patio in the Boston Area to Friends and Neighbors?

If you want that “wow factor” for your backyard patio with a custom hardscape design, come talk to us. We’ve been making hardscapes and amazing-looking paver walls and patio spaces for families and homeowners in Greater Boston for over 25 years.

Dreaded Deer in the Garden

When it comes to keeping your yard beautiful and thriving, protecting your garden from cute but menacing deer should be a top priority.

With some exceptions, deer will eat or at least trample on almost anything in your garden, and with fall upon us and the winter months fast approaching here in Greater Boston, suburban deer will want to feast on what’s available.

If deer are starving they will eat almost anything. This typically occurs when there is a heavy snow load or loss of habitat thereby reducing their natural foraging areas. This forces them out into your yard to sample your shrubbery and tulips. 

Why You Should Protect Your Landscaping Plants From Deer

Deer can be an amazing sight in your yard, but once they start feeding on common landscaping plants like your favorite hostas, they become a problem. They severely damage your landscape plantings, reducing them to mere sticks or eating them to the ground. Plus, easily accessible landscaping plants as a source of food will cause deer to congregate, increasing the odds of disease transmission.

Deer are creatures of habit, so once they find your hostas, they will return to finish them off. They eat fresh buds on trees and rub their antlers on tree trunks damaging bark. The best options to deter deer are physical barriers, removing plants they forage on and spraying plants with deterrents.

Top Methods for Deterring Deer in Greater Boston

Planting and Landscaping Tips to Protect Your Yard

1. Build a Landscaping Fence

The absolute best solution that is almost 100% effective is to install a fence. Some deer have the ability to jump as high as 12 feet, so any landscaping fence should be at least eight feet in height and well built so deer can’t jump over or break it.

Deer fences are most often made of welded wire or plastic and almost disappear into the surrounding landscape. A six-foot stockade fence is also effective as deer won’t jump over something if they can’t see the other side.

2. Select Good Landscaping Plants to Deter Deer

Proper plant selection is paramount to reducing damage. Yes, deer will eat almost anything but there are certain plants that they will skip over; it has to do more with the characteristics of plants.

Deer tend to dislike hairy or fuzzy foliage, such as lambs ear, yarrow or lungwort. The amount of “fuziness” isn’t important, as long as they have hairy leaves. Deer won’t touch your ornamental grasses, so plant away.

Also consider fragrant foliage. Most herbs fall into this category including sage, thyme, oregano and lavender. Deer will usually also pass over boxwood, salvias, bee balm and Russian sage. Crush the leaves of a plant before you purchase it and if it has a scent, the deer won’t eat it.

3. Liquid Sprays and Active Deterrents

If it’s too late and deer are already chomping away, some liquid deterrents can be effective. Spray repellents work by using taste and odor with an additive to help them stick to the plant. 

Some brands to try are Liquid Fence and Deer Away. Keep a few bottles by your door as they need to be sprayed weekly, or more if there’s rain.

Scaring deer away can be effective as well. I’ve had my small dogs bark out the windows and it seemed to work for a little while. Motion-activated sprinklers with infrared sensors, however, can work wonders and frighten deer with a spray of water.

Popular Landscaping Techniques to Deter Deer in the Boston Area

At Land Design Associates, we have been helping families with gardening and planting support for many years to help keep their yards looking stunning and stay deer-free! If you want to beautify your garden with popular landscaping plants and shrubs or fencing products and want to consult the experts in regards to deer retention, talk to us and we’ll be happy to help!

With ever-increasing home-energy costs, leveraging your landscape design in Boston during the cold winters and hot summers can serve as a lifesaver for improving the energy efficiency of your home.

How can you use backyard landscaping and best practices in yard design to make those small differences that we all know add up over time and impact your family’s bottom line?

Before things got so high-tech and people started to simply adjust their thermostats, landscape architecture design was a common way to make a home more comfortable in varied weather conditions. Not only does it remain a cost-effective way to control for internal temperatures without incurring costly overuses from your home’s heating system or air conditioning, the same practices of landscaping trees and unique backyard landscape designs can help protect your home’s exterior from high winds and add a tasteful decor to the outdoor areas of your home.

Build a Wall of Tall Landscaping Trees

In the Boston area, cold winter winds blow down from Canada out of the northwest. As they move past your house, they rob warm energy from the inside of your house.

Want to keep these energy thieves from pulling heat from your house all winter? Consider building a wall of landscaping trees near your home to keep the northern mistrals away. Known as a windbreak, this was a common design feature when there was no thermostat to reach for.

If you look at old farms, you will often see large masses of evergreens designed to shelter the house from cold winter winds.

First, determine which is the northwest side of your house. Then talk with a Boston landscape designer to help plan and build a windscreen out of tall evergreens such as Norway spruce, western red cedar, or Canadian hemlock, which are often the best evergreen trees for landscaping. Incorporating these trees into your landscape design will stop the wind from sucking energy from your house and draining your heating budget.

Be Cool in the Summer With Landscaping Shrubs for Shade

When things get toasty in the summer, why not use an old-fashioned way to stay cool and mitigate costs for air conditioning at the same time?

Look at older homes and you will most certainly find large shade trees planted on the south side of the house. The shade from the trees keeps the house cool in the hot summer months and lowers the cooling costs of air conditioning.

Trees like sugar maples were commonly used for this purpose (and farmers could get pancake syrup too!).

By including trees and shrubs as part of your Boston backyard landscape design, you can not only improve cost efficiencies for your home but also make patio and backyard gatherings more enjoyable on those hot and sunny days. The dense leaf canopy of one or more trees makes things more comfortable in the summer.

In the winter, when the leaves drop, shade trees such as maples allow warming sunlight to heat the house.

Landscape Design for Creating a Wind Tunnel

If you have the space in your yard, you can use plants to accelerate wind speeds around your home and deliver nice summer breezes to your house.

In the Boston area, the summer wind comes from the southwest. Using trees and shrubs as part of your landscape installation in the Boston area, you can create an opening that is shaped like a funnel. The wide part will capture the summer breezes and bring them through the funnel. As the funnel narrows, the wind will accelerate increasing its cooling effect on your home.

This will create moving air to make you more comfortable as you sit on your patio in the hot days of August. It will also allow cooling breezes to come through your open windows on the southwest side of your home.

Stay Warm or Cool With a Trusted Boston Landscaper

At Land Design Associates, we have been helping families use landscape elements to improve their lives for more than 25 years. If you want to beautify the exterior of your home and improve energy efficiency for your Boston house during the winter or summer months with trees and shrubs for landscaping, talk to us to build your dream yard.

Grill, chill, entertain

The opportunities are endless

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Your patio doesn’t have to be just a big rectangle by the back door. The site of your patio affects how often it will be used and how well it serves its intended purpose. Whether you are designing your own or working with a designer, here are some things to consider in the planning phase.

Function

Function is the most important factor in patio design. Most functions fall into dining, relaxing and gardening. Envision all of the occasions and activities for how you will utilize the patio. Also think of when you anticipate being outside and what will draw people out into the yard. Will it be used for entertaining? How many people and what size dining table will you need?  Or perhaps you want a small and quiet space to relax in? Or both? Also consider other features such as a fire pit, fireplace, grill and spa.

Location

Location is paramount to patio design. Once you have narrowed down the function, the next step is location. Do you want to be close to house or farther away? Do you prefer an intimate space or something more open? Do you currently enjoy a place in your yard to enjoy and can that space be improved and more enjoyable?  Try placing some chairs where you think you would want to have the patio. How does it feel to be there? Is it pleasant, are there views or areas that need to be obstructed? You may also want it adjacent to existing doors for continuity from the inside to the outside.

Dining and cooking

Patios are often best placed close to the kitchen for convenience and ease of bringing food and items outdoors. Place the grill away from where smoke may enter the house or irritate diners. Outdoor kitchen islands are a versatile element as you may use it not just for preparing and serving food but also for extra seating with bar stools.

Create Outdoor Rooms

Divide one large patio into individual spaces. This creates outdoor “rooms” as you have inside your home.  A seating area a bit farther away from the main patio creates a destination and a conversational area. Select the furniture before sizing this area. It can be a great space for a pair of chaise lounges or a fire-pit.

Fire pits and fireplaces

Fire features are great as a focal point for gathering the family together in the evening.  They also will make your home a “go-to” location for your friends and neighbors to get together and relax. Consider wood burning fire features for ambiance or gas for ease of use.

Views

Views are key to having a nice space to be in. Are there suitable views you would like to take advantage of or would screening with a fence or planting be necessary? You can create a view or visual interest in other ways. Having a focal point in the distance such as a small sculpture or bird bath.

Light and shade

Do you want to lounge in the sun or prefer a shadier spot and consider what time(s) of day the patio will be utilized the most. The addition of carefully placed trees, a shade umbrella or pergola offer more versatility.

No matter what you’re looking for in a patio for your home in the Newton, Needham, Wellesley area, the experts at Land Design Associates can help. Whether you’re looking for a large multi-faceted outdoor patio layout or a quiet spot for coffee or to read a book, Land Design Associates has you covered. We have over 25 years experience to help. Contact us today to learn more or give us a call at 781-769-3286.

Planting fragrant shrubs adds a wonderful addition to your garden. Once you’ve experienced the enjoyment of a fragrant plant, you’ll want to add more. You’ll want to include shrubs that smell good near patios, entries, kitchen windows and driveways for even more of that sweet flower smell!

Lilac

Some lilacs are more fragrant than others, so buy them when they are in bloom to pick one that you prefer. There are hundreds of varieties to choose from however you can expect most to possess a strong, fresh fragrance. So which are the best? Here are a few that are available.

Maiden’s Blush- Blooms earlier that most and blooms well as a young plant. The blooms are fluffier that the standard and it is extremely hardy.

For something different try Beauty of Moscow. It is a very fragrant double flowered cultivar and is known for its double florets with a two tone pink/white color. Beauty of Moscow has some of the largest and most fragrant flowers of all lilacs.

Azalea

Some azaleas not only have spectacular blooms but can also be fragrant. A very cold hardy selection is the swamp azalea. An appealing plant native, it bears funnel shaped flowers that bloom profusely. It has a strong clove-like perfume that rivals roses. It prefers part shade and is perfect for shrub borders.

Roseshell azalea has pink, funnel shaped flowers in mid to late spring that appear in large clusters of 4-12 blooms. It also grows well in part shade and appreciates moist, well-drained soil. It is a vigorous and showy azalea.

.

Summersweet

Blooms in mid-summer, this popular native has a sweet-spicy scent similar to a carnation. The flowers appear in narrow, upright panicles and are most typically white. A pink variety is available as well, named ‘Ruby Spice’ that grows to 8’ wide and tall. Flowers are very attractive to butterflies and other pollinators. More compact white flowering varieties include ‘Sugartina’ and ‘Sixteen Candles’. Water regularly to maintain moist soil for best bloom.

Butterfly bush

This sturdy shrub has bold blossoms that emerge late summer. The fragrance has a sweet honey-like scent and is available in many shades of blue, purple, magenta and white. This plant will sometimes die back to the ground in winter and produce new shoots in spring. Some to try are ‘Miss Ruby’, a dark pink one and the ‘Lo and Behold’ line that are smaller and more compact.

koreanspice viburnum

This is one of the most fragrant shrubs available. Dense, white, round flower heads are formed from many smaller flowers that resemble a snowball. It’s spicy, sweet, vanillery scent carries across the yard so place it where you can enjoy its fragrance. Every yard should have one. This viburnum is not typically a plant for a tiny spaces as  it grows slowly to 6-8 feet tall. More compact varieties have recently been available. ‘Cayuga’ is a go-to variety that is somewhat compact and has an abundance of flowers. ‘Spice Baby’ is a bit smaller, staying to 4-5 feet tall and wide.

No matter what you’re looking for in a landscape for your home, the experts at Land Design Associates can help. Contact us today to learn more or give us a call at 781-769-3286

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