Expressive landscape designs featured during HBA Parade of Homes

For many of today’s homebuyers, landscape designs play a major role in planning their overall living environment, particularly since there are so many outdoor living space options – features like pools, covered decks, outdoor kitchens, and the like – for “alfresco enjoyment” nearly year-round.

During this year’s 69th Annual Fall Parade of Homes (KCParadeofHomes.com), which starts Sept. 24 and runs through Oct. 9, prospective buyers will find numerous homes from which to draw inspiration to incorporate into their own landscape space designs.

According to Shane Hoitsma, Landscape Designer with Next to Nature Landscaping (nexttonature.biz), homeowners are much more interested in large outdoor living spaces where they can entertain and relax. Companies like his can help.

“Our design concept is to create natural looking outdoor living areas with natural landscaping to match,” said Hoitsma. “What sets us apart is that being a design/build company, we can handle almost any project in-house and do a lot of the work ourselves.”

When thinking about how to incorporate landscaping into your home, Hoitsma said it’s important to keep in mind the functionality, maintenance, and environment around the landscaping.

“Some common misperceptions we run into are cost and drainage,” he said. “Homeowners often see a beautiful landscape but underestimate these two things.” Other often overlooked areas include mature plant size and irrigation for all the plant material and lawn.

On this year’s Parade, prospective buyers can see examples of Next to Nature’s landscape design at Parade of Homes entries by Willis Custom Homes and Cecil & Ray Homes, both in the Loch Lloyd community in Kansas City, as well as in Starr Homes LLC’s entry in Mills Farm – The Manor in Overland Park.

Another trend in 2016 is homeowners choosing enclosed patio and porch spaces, which create an extension of a home’s living area, according to Karl Schottler, owner of Kansas City, Kan.-based Paramount Landscape.

“Homeowners are putting their fireplaces and televisions on the porch because the transition of moving things outside takes too much time,” Schottler said. “People still want a nicely landscaped back yard, but they don’t necessarily want to be in the middle of it. It is this balance between architecture and landscape right now where people want more convenience, but they also want to view nice landscapes.”

From an aesthetic perspective, Schottler said, he is offering more mass planting that makes a larger statement. That means that instead of planting one evergreen, he will plant three, five or even seven together.

“It’s positioned to be like art, something to be viewed from a distance,” Schottler said.

Prospective buyers can see examples of Paramount Landscape’s work during the Fall Parade of Homes at J.S. Robinson entries in Brighton’s Landing and Forest View in Olathe, Bristol Ridge in Lenexa and Mills Crossing in Overland Park.

Presented by the Home Builder’s Association of Greater Kansas City (HBA) and sponsored by Stewart Title, the Fall Parade of Homes highlights the latest in home design, construction, and technology, plus provides buyers the chance to research the abundance of local builders.

This year’s Parade offers 318 single-family homes, townhomes, and maintenance provided villas constructed by 96 Kansas City metropolitan area builders across five counties on both sides of the state line.

This story was originally published September 21, 2016 at 12:07 AM with the headline "Expressive landscape designs featured during HBA Parade of Homes."