i posted in your other thread. have you decided to paint your door? as far as landscaping i wouldn't add a trellis on either side of your door. i think that would make the entry feel very cramped. a railing up the steps for sure needs to be added. i would also add a walkway to the steps from the driveway and/or street depending on where visitors park.

as far as landscaping do you have a decent nursery nearby? they can help with what can be planted where based on sun. i would make yhe planting eds much deeper to balance the height of the house.

For landscaping advice please tell us the nearest big city & state. Much of the US is in drought which means it's a bad time to add new plantings. Please indicate the location of your well & septic since that affects the placement of trees.

A sidewalk to the front door is needed. Several small flowering trees are also needed.

Agreed with previous comments and would be helpful to know where in Zone 5 you are. Your planting beds should be much deeper— I would plan on having a row of shrubs that get some height next to the foundation (but these should be planted ~4 feet away from the foundation to leave a gap for maintenance and prevent critter habitats or watering next to your foundation), with some space for wildflowers or lower-mounding border plants in front.

Smaller flowering trees planted at 45 degree angles about 10/15 feet out from the corners of your foundation would add some height/shade but still preserve those long-range views from your windows.

In a country setting the elements can be harsher, so if you stick to plants that are native to the eastern half of the US (which I am assuming you are in), your garden will be much more resilient. And simple landscape designs with old favorites always work well for farmhouse settings.

For small flowering trees, consider eastern redbud or serviceberry. Foundation plantings of Annabelle hydrangeas would look great with the colors of your house and these are a cultivar of smooth hydrangea which is native to the eastern us. Dogwood shrubs would be another good choice for variety. For wildflowers the options are endless, but consider options that will be easier to maintain or keep tidy, maybe coneflower, black eyed susan, woodland phlox and the like. Nodding onion, chives or ornamental alliums make for nice border plants too.

What a great house/ setting!

Thank you so much!! I am in Northern IL near the Wisconsin border. Nearest big city is Rockford, IL. Harsh winters- lots of wind.

Answers to questions: We are thinking yellow or red for the door. I agree a railing is needed...may be able to do that soon I hope.

Well/septic is in the backyard so won’t be an issue out front.

What do you mean by deeper beds? Dig down deeper or come out further? I’m sorry, I am really not a gardener 😬 But I want to learn!!

I have a purple sandcherry shrub my kids just bought my husband. Ideas for placement?

Just chiming in on door color. We have a dark blue house as well (not quite as dark but close - hardie deep ocean) and we did a yellow door. I think it looks great. We are in a suburb of Minneapolis, so a zone even colder than yours. We did some yellow accents for bushes and trees - a harvest gold crabapple, some lemon candy ninebark, neon burst dogwood, and sunjoy gold pillar barberry. For flowering bushes, we put in hydrangeas. We also did ornamental grasses (we did all karl forester but there are a lot to choose from). I think you need some height around your foundation so planting things that will get taller than that would be good. Daylilies are probably not tall enough, at least on their own. You could plant larger bushes behind and daylilies in front.

"Deeper" beds mean distance from the house, not into the ground.

Here are a few suggestions:

Wow!!!

That is enormously helpful to me- thank you!!!

Doug's rendering doesn't include evergreen shrubs for late fall/winter color. Perhaps you receive so much snowfall that yews would be covered up anyway.

Right- we can figure out the plants we want....but just seeing the different heights and placement and the deeper beds is so helpful!!

I have the entire south side of the house open too which isn’t pictured. That will be my next post 😉

My rendering includes dwarf yews of 2 varieties which are evergreen.

I'd go yellow and native, like the lemon ninebark mentioned above. I'd look for some evergreen rhodos instead of boring yews. Doug's designs usually are out of scale. In this case, that hydrangea on the corner is too close to the house.

I don't think that is rhododendron country. Years ago, I had a gardening friend in Rockford, and I'm pretty sure that her soil pH was even worse for ericacious plants than mine.

When picking plants, keep in mind what they are going to look like in the off season. That can be a big issue with trellises, windowboxes, and things like that.

Some deciduous shrubs look better during the winter than others, but you are going to want a fair number of evergreens.

What is the deer situation like?

This is the winter appearance:

The deer are not an issue.

Is a step handrail in your plan? I feel that could be both functional and attractive.

In the plan- but not the budget right away.

I know I could get some inexpensive hand rails and I may go that route as a temporary fix. But I’d like to have something built.

We have an old farmhouse too in Northwestern Illinois. I went a little crazy on the hostas but they were free. Anyway, our plantings are always blooming in some way. We followed the Roy Diblik and Piet Oudolph methods. Spring has white daffodils, followed by wild pink geranium, and ferns. Then we have for summer, pink betony flowering and the hostas flower with white. Then later in summer we have the hydrangeas, the Joe pye weed, the huchera Autumn bride, and white wood asters.

You wouldn’t have to come out as far as we did with the beds, but I like the idea of possibly a columnar spruce to the side of your home to cover the electrical conduit. Then build outward, and think of some foundation plantings like evergreen, grasses etc. should be I think 70%, then 30% should be flowering.

I just took four pics outside. The drought is wreaking havoc on the plants. The betony is barely flowering.

Some option to soften an exterior with colorful plants and evergreens.

So beautiful!!!!! I can’t even believe that’s my house lol

Mrs. Beasley, you have a beautiful home!

I love Dough's oak leaf hydrangea in his first rendering. I would do a lovely fern garden on the east side of the house with some nice shade plants thrown in like Solomon's Seal. Deep green will look stunning next to your beautiful navy color.

I too suggest even a rudimentary hand rail at the front. You could build one to match the white wood railing around the side of your house.

Great renderings (Doug and Celery) and real life examples (Mrs Beasley) being provided here!

On a sidenote— I personally love ferns, but have been told that in country settings they can potentially attract snakes to your house. Don’t know the accuracy of that claim, but if that’s a potential concern for you, there would be other plants believed to be snake-repelling that you could also incorporate (I’ve read alliums/onions/chives family and marigolds are good for this).

I don't see why ferns would attract snakes any more than any other plantings. They are just looking for food and shelter. In fact, ime, ferns have fewer pests than many other plants and thus would provide less food for snakes. And anyway, snakes are generally a good thing to have in a garden. Also, most anecdotes about certain plants repelling certain animals are wishful thinking.

I don’t mind snakes...we find the occasional snake or two in the yard. They’re kinda neat- of course I’ve not encountered any poisonous ones as of yet.

Not trying to hate on snakes! They are definitely a sign of a good ecosystem and can be beneficial. The thought came to mind as I recently helped out on a project at a farmstead, where the owners apparently had issues they attributed to having ferns next to the house in the past. 🤷‍♂️ But I digress— back to the original intent of this post!

Here's another set of options to consider, using mostly historically-used plants to match your historic home.

I started with a tall black L-shaped trellis set far enough out from the corner where the electric meter is for access behind it, with a vigorous white climbing rose to hide the utility equipment. Then some yews (Taxus canadensis) for an evergreen foundation connecting to the doorway, candytuft (Iberis sempervirens) as a groundcover carpet, your Stella d'Oro(?) daylilies massed under the rose, and a white lilac right of the door for balancing height. Could stop there.

Optional additions from right to left: lady's mantle (Alchemilla mollis) for its bright chartreuse, spring bulbs (Narcissus 'Tete-a-Tete' and 'Cheerfulness', maybe?) followed by Liatris spicata growing through the candytuft for spring and summer color in the space under the window, maybe a forsythia (choose a manageable-sized cultivar) for spring color at the corner before the rose gets going, Hydrangea 'Annabelle' (or one of her newer cousins), additional hostas, and a few foxgloves flanking the shadier side porch. (In hindsight, I might use either the forsythia or the hydrangea, but not both.)

I can't see enough of the property to know what walkways would be appropriate (just grass? gravel? stepping stones? more solid paving? and where should they lead?), so I left the grass. If the front door eventually sees more use, you could add a more all-weather path to it at that time.

Settlers usually surrounded these farmhouses with trees for shade and shelter from wind. I only see the one large living tree (maybe due to the tornado?). I would want to get replacements started as soon as possible, since they take years to grow. (I added one on the right in this rendering.) Small trees, even whips, are much less expensive than large ones, and they will adapt to their new home more quickly and surpass larger transplants in size in just a few years anyway. For me, that would be high on the priority list.

As for the other plants, do you have any gardening friends who might share? Most of the plants shown have been passed from gardener to gardener for years. Landscaping doesn't have to come from a store or cost a fortune.

Your house looks great! Have fun dressing it!

I saw on your other thread you were debating colors for the door. I would consider a deeper yellow. We did SW Butternut on the recommendation of our designer and it's a really lovely yellow.

I do love that color. My husband is more understated and I’m almost sure he’d veto it LOL But I think it’s beautiful!!