Landscape solutions

Shade bathes the curving path to the front door.

Water sometimes floods the back yard.

Grade changes make landscaping the lot tricky.

And to add to the challenge, there are the deer that consider most any vegetation a smorgasbord.

Award-winning plans solved these problems faced by suburban homeowners.

Here are some of the top projects in the Excellence in Landscape Awards sponsored by the Illinois Landscape Contractors Association.

Challenge: Shade falls along the curving lannon stone path that connects the driveway to the front door of the Lake Forest French country home.

Solution: Add the yellow blooms of ligularia, white impatiens and hydrangeas to the Korean boxwood, pachysandra, Japanese yews and river birch that will stand by you year-round.

Surprise: Maidenhair ferns flanking the door welcome guests with a graceful wave.

Contractor: Don Fiore, president of Don Fiore Co. Inc., Lake Bluff.

Challenge: The Glen Ellyn yard where a home was torn down and a new one built has grade variations of at least 4 feet.

Solution: Terracing and a series of walls built with gunmetal granite boulders.

Surprise: Two old decrepit stone walls were discovered. They curve toward each other, are moss covered and make a perfect spot for a traditional council ring around a fire pit. Plantings around the ring include yarrow, Kobold liatris, Pink Knock Out Roses and sedum kamchaticum or stonecrop.

Contractor: Matt Haber, design director for Western DuPage Landscaping Inc., Naperville.

Challenge: E. Fay Jones, who worked with Frank Lloyd Wright, designed a prairie-style house in Barrington Hills. A strictly native meadow does not have enough color for most people. And the plants had to be deer-resistant.

Solution: Different varieties of sumac, swamp white oak, bottlebrush buckeye and redbud help create a native look while giving that all-important winter structure.

Surprise: Perhaps 80 percent of the plantings are native to Illinois. May Queen shasta daisy, false indigo, purple coneflower and the fall-blooming New England aster, black-eyed Susans and goldenrod are among 150 nonwoody or herbaceous varieties.

Contractor: Tony Lo Bello, project director for Mariani Landscape, Lake Bluff.

Challenge: The rear yard of this Burr Ridge house is sometimes very wet, and the front yard was consumed by a circular drive.

Solution: Create a private front yard garden room screened with Norway spruce along the property line. This includes new limestone steps to an entry court or front porch and a knot garden of green boxwood and red barberry with seasonal flowers like angelonia tucked in.

Surprise: A knot garden can be built in a space as small as 5 square feet as long there's enough definition so the knot doesn't close up in a few years. Choices: Two heights of boxwood or different colors of shrubs -- yellow, red, silver and green.

Contractor: Tony Lo Bello, project director for Mariani Landscape, Lake Bluff.

Challenge: The owner of the Barrington Hills house wanted patios, not a deck, but the drop from the main level of the home to the new swimming pool is about 12 feet.

Solution: A series of landings, steps and retaining walls of concrete finished with a stucco material and topped with stone to match the house. This all needed a strong foundation, drainage and the right design for aesthetics and views.

Surprise: Deer-resistant plantings include boxwood, spruce, juniper, Flower Carpet and Knock Out roses, sages, salvias, ornamental grasses, shasta daisies, coneflowers, and stonecrop sedum.

Contractor: Brent Johnson, vice president and owner of Nilco Inc., Huntley.