Currently, we are in the 'nothing' phase. Our house is very symmetrical, and this is the one area of our property where I feel I should stick with a traditional landscaping plan. The grade in our front yard drops off about three feet toward each side of the house, further complicating landscaping decisions. We had brick and stone planters built in 2007 to help visually level the area and to keep whatever we plant in better scale with the facade of the house.
This part of the property is the only area where I feel the need to conform to a more conventional design. To me, old houses need boxwood and that's what I had my heart set on. After researching various types of boxwood, from traditional English boxwood, to American boxwood, to some of the more modern cultivars ... and I settled on Green Mountain boxwood. It resembles American box, without the perskickety nature. It is tolerant of a wide variety of conditions and is resistant to many of the boxwood pests.
I loaded Daniel up yesterday, and he and I headed to Roxbury Mills nursery in downtown Fredericksburg to buy our bushes. They had eight beautiful ones in stock, and eight is exactly what we need, and I didn't want to let them slip away. We paid for them, and put SOLD tags on them, and I will pick them up in a few weeks once the hot summer weather is behind us and planting conditions moderate a bit. (The pots in the front of the house in the first photo are there to try out spacing to decide where the bushes should be planted.)
This is one more step toward making the front of our house a feature, instead of a work-in-progress. It's about time.