I have been a residential landscape photographer my whole life, and I guess you could say I brought my work home with me!

Filming other people’s yards, year after year, you start to get a feel for what works and what doesn’t in a landscape, and why. Now granted, if I am there photographing someone’s yard, it’s pretty much a given that something beautiful is definitely happening at that location, otherwise I wouldn’t be there. But some landscaping ideas are simply more successful than others, and the trick becomes being able to identify what it is you love about large, majestic yards (or even parks and botanical gardens, or other places where money seems to be no object), and figuring out how to achieve that same concept, feeling, or function at your own house... but in a smaller, more accessible way.

Better Homes & Garden, if you have already reached your monthly quotient of wrap-around porches and have room left to feature something a little DIFFERENT, I'm your guy.

While waiting on my house to be built, I recently moved into the 400-square-foot garage on the back of my property. It seemed like a good idea at the time. But fast forward six months - of living, sleeping, cooking, and eating in a single room (albeit a very stylish and well-appointed room, I have to admit) - I found myself on the verge of going absolutely bonkers. This tiny space had long-since been filled to capacity with my ever-growing collection of beautiful, worldly things (an untrained eye might call them tchotchkes), and so it became quickly apparent that if I was going to expand or improve my living situation in any meaningful way, it was going to have to happen outside, not in.

I had already purchased the perfect tub for my new house, but I guess my mind wasn’t completely ready to abandon the hunt for clawfoot tubs, because I inexplicably continued looking at them long after I’d found what I needed for the bathroom.

Which is why there is now a red clawfoot tub out in the yard.

As my tiny living space (and several storage units) can attest, I have very little room left to accommodate any more… “inner beauty.” Which is why I have pivoted: Now I can now barely walk through a store, antique market, or yard sale, without thinking, “I know I have no room inside, but I wonder if I could spray that really heavily with weather-sealant and put it out in the yard?” Or, “Don’t you think I could put a plant in this?”

It turns out, you can shove a plant in just about anything. Also, if you’re willing to risk it getting irrecoverably ruined, you can STICK JUST ABOUT ANYTHING OUT IN THE YARD. Please view this more as a lesson, than a tip.

However, here is a helpful tip, it’s one of the tricks I often use for photoshoots, when I want something to be spilling over a pot, but don’t have time to wait for it to (actually) do that:

Buy a hanging basket. Take the trailing, flowering, plant out of its basket and plop it in a pot. Suddenly you have something that looks like it’s been growing and thriving all summer long! Your party guests will never know your clever deception, and will assume you must have the greenest thumb in town.

On this same note, waiting for plants to grow and mature and is all good and fine for your landscape beds, but when planting up your pots, now is not the time for all that. You want it to look good immediately (because it’s not going to be here forever, maybe only a season; with some flowers, maybe they only bloom for a few weeks!). So don’t approach your pots with the same mentality as your landscape, that they will eventually look good over time, no, approach it the same way you would go about making a floral bouquet, and really cram those flowers in there from the start.

Another small deception is how you can achieve a lot of the same qualities you love about the water features you’ve seen in fancy gardens, when you don’t have the money or space to install an actual stream in your yard, or an extravagant waterfall, etc. For the stream, forget it entirely – just suggest it with a bridge! Complete the look with river rocks on either side, reminiscent of a dry creek bed. Ta-dum! You now have a stream.

And if you love the cascading visuals and delectable sound of falling water, but aren’t quite ready to commission a waterfall installation, sounds like you need A GARDEN FOUNTAIN. While technically it is a water feature, yes, a fountain can be purchased, assembled, and enjoyed within hours, not weeks.

Also you can take it with you if you’re thinking of moving soon, due to your neighbor’s invasive and unbearable BAMBOO.