Landscape Planning Symbols

Trees

• Trees dictate the shade and sun in a yard and can mature to send roots everywhere and tower over porches, pools and patios. Know which trees will stay green in winter and which will fill the fish pond with autumn leaves before you plant them. Large deciduous trees are represented by a rough circle with three-pronged branch tips radiating out from the center. Evergreens are circles made of straight lines radiating from the center to the perimeter or a perfectly even scribble of outward-facing "U"s with the prongs pointed away from center. Ornamental trees are flowery and curly edged circles.

Shrubs

• Deciduous shrubs are clusters of round shapes with perimeters formed of small, bubble-like circles or symmetrical scallops. Evergreen shrubs are clusters with stick starbursts in the centers. They may also have reversed-scalloped edges. A landscape architect could choose to show relative area for shrubs by making the clusters small or large.

Groundcovers and Accent Plants

• Groundcovers are indicated by blocks of repeat scribble patterns. They may be feathered like a stack of leaves to indicate large-leafed plants, truly scribbled every-which-way to show a dense mass of foliage, or precisely repeated shapes like "U"s to specify a more formal planting. The fact that they are not circles is a reminder that they are meant to spread out and fill in between the focal points of the landscaping. Accent plant symbols are imperfect circles, more detailed than other symbols to indicate flowers or showy features of the plant. Accent plants may be concentric scribbles that look like a winter cabbage plant, lots of tiny stars to indicate flowers, or a wavy rounded shape partly filled in with smaller and smaller wavy circles.

Hardscaping

• Fences, walls, patios and decks are represented with hard-edged shapes. A brick patio or flagstone deck is an outline of the surface, "bricked" in with identical rectangles or "paved" with irregular stones. A wooden deck is covered in slanted lines, like boards. Rough aggregate, such as a pebbled surface is partly covered in asymmetrical ovals and bubbles. Metal fences are implied by a line with a few "X"s on it to resemble clipped wire. Stacked stone is a line of irregular stone shapes overlapping each other. Wood or bamboo fences are sketched like the top edges of boards or the round tops of bamboo poles in a line.

The Key

• A formal plan will come with its own key for symbols because every artist draws a slightly different interpretation. The key is usually in a lower corner of the plan with a sample of the symbol and its name. Some landscape designers will draw realistic trees and plants and color them to give you the best sense of what to expect. If you are designing your own landscape, try cutting out the symbols and moving them around on a paper map of the yard to see how the general ideas shape up.