Modern Prairie Front Landscape - New Berlin, WI

2019 Gold Award Residential Design

Association of Professional Landscape Designers

2018 Gold Award for Excellence in Residential Landscape Design and Construction

Wisconsin Landscape Contractors Association

A New Berlin, Wisconsin prairie-style landscape designed with Asian, Prairie, and mid-century modern influence, with front patio, bluestone front walk, and a sentinel stone house number feature.

The existing landscape surrounding our clients’ prairie-style home in New Berlin, Wisconsin was dated and lacked cohesion. While it had originally been intended to reference an Asian garden, the design fell short. The architecture of the home, however, remained well suited to that influence, and we were asked to create a landscape that blended Asian, Prairie, and mid-century modern design elements. One clear directive guided the planting design: keep the flowering perennials simple and minimal.

The front yard redesign began with a new walk composed of concrete and bluestone. A square of irregular bluestone is aligned on axis with the front door while sitting on the diagonal with a Prairie-style urn, the only element retained from the original landscape. A concrete patio was added adjacent to the front porch to create an informal seating area. Along the driveway, full-range bluestone square steppers set within slate chip mulch improve accessibility for passengers exiting vehicles.

Planting beds surrounding the walk and patio feature a restrained palette of flowering perennials, ornamental grasses, and shrubs, with no red, yellow, or orange blooms, per the client’s request. Serviceberry trees provide vertical structure and privacy around the front patio, while a Firebird crabapple anchors the primary front planting bed.

As the design neared completion, the clients requested the inclusion of a sentinel stone, a traditional element in Asian gardens. After researching its significance, we sourced the stone directly from local quarries and involved the client in the selection process. The stone ultimately became the perfect location for the house numbers, with the plaque’s shape, finish, and typography carefully selected to complement the home and landscape. Once installed, the sentinel stone became the final, unifying element of the project. We were also asked to assist with selecting new exterior paint colors for the home, completing the transformation shown here.