Creating seating in your outdoor room.

Sure, you can go and buy an outdoor lounge setting for a certain spot near the home to let you have a lazy lounge moment or family gathering and am not suggesting they do not have their place. But there is one type of seat when designed with thought and connectivity to the garden that gives that very special healing sensation.

At the end of a good days work, it is lovely to wonder out into the garden with grass under foot and a cold drink to a spot solely designed to give back. I say give back as the healing powers of a well thought through spot is priceless. It’s not just the seating arrangement but the garden and how it folds with this spot along with the purposely organised views. There is nothing better than being comfortable enough to let your thoughts drift. It is this aspect that gives such healing.

Look at your garden and sometimes just by carrying a simple chair to various spots in the garden and sitting can actually tell you ‘NO that’s not the spot’ or ‘Yes it is the spot’. From that simple design test, you can find your own special spot.

Sure, there may be an element in the good spot that needs softening because it is visually jarring from say a window or distant power line but that’s also OK. You can put something in the foreground to visually defuse it whatever it is that is not so cool to look at.

I’m a sucker for a beautiful ornamental trees that gives shape, movement, form and colour. In my own garden I have a collection of Acers from the Acer palmatum as the main anchor tree with an Acer palmatum atropurpureum showing its amazing red wine leaves to the Acer negundo Flamingo and its sensational white green and pink variegated leaves supported by clusters of seeds as if hanging like earrings. A feast for the eye but a feast that lets your mind settle especially if you are seated in amongst such nature.

Once you have found that spot, think about the seating and how it can melt with the garden setting.

www.scenicbluedesign.com.au

Chris Slaughter