Designing a planting scheme for a front-yard border, using Claude

Large language models seem to be pretty good at a lot of things. But, do they have green fingers, and can they find their way around a garden center?

We have a border in our front yard, entirely bereft of plants, which is clearly visible from our living room through a set of large, retractable glass doors. After several unsuccessful attempts at planting perennials of various kinds, we decided to start from scratch, clear the border of vegetation, and replant it.

Local garden centers offer design services, where a horticultural expert will visit your home, size up the job and propose a planting scheme to match your situation, preferences, and budget. One nearby center offered such a service for $599.

I turned, instead, to a very different kind of expert, one with whom I have collaborated successfully on a series of photography-related projects: the Anthropic LLM, Claude.

I currently pay a $20 monthly subscription for access to the model.

Here is a brief account of my experience using Claude to design a planting scheme for my troublesome front-yard border.

Objective

A customized planting scheme, reflecting the aspect and surroundings of the border, encompassing a range of plants which grow well in San Diego, including a list of those plants, the quantities required, and a diagram illustrating the proposed layout.

Keith’s prompt

I would like help designing a planting scheme for a border in my front yard. I have described the situation and what I have in mind, in detail, below. Let me know if it would be better to submit this prompt in multiple parts, rather than all at once. 

I live in San Diego, California, where the climate is mild all year round and there are very rarely frosts. We enjoy a large percentage of bright, sunny days.

The border is approximately 20 feet long, and 3-4 feet deep, running in a slight curve. The border faces 135 degrees southeast and is in full sun during the middle of the day. There is a 4 ft high, white stucco wall behind the border, and a stand of three palm trees in the center of the border. 

The border is well watered with an underground soaker system, so that the palm trees have adequate water.

I would like to plant a selection of low-growing shrubs and hardy perennials.

Ideally, the shrubs would be evergreen, with a maximum height of 18 to 24 inches. It would be a bonus if they also flowered. Something like a variegated hebe or pittosporum.

The perennials should be flowering. They should be primarily low-growing, but one or two slightly taller plants, such as hemerocallis might be worth including.

The color scheme should be coordinating and tasteful.

Could you design such a planting scheme, ideally with a suggested arrangement of the shrubs and perennials?

Claude’s response

What a lovely project — and you've given me everything I need to work with. No need to split it into parts; this is a well-described brief. Let me design a planting scheme for you.

Given your conditions — full sun, white stucco backdrop, the three palms as a centerpiece, and a soaker system — I'd suggest a warm Mediterranean palette of soft lilacs, creamy whites, dusky pinks, and silver-grey foliage. This will complement the white wall beautifully without competing with it, and all the plants below thrive in San Diego's climate.

Claude’s proposed planting scheme

Claude’s plant recommendations

Pittosporum tenuifolium 'Silver Queen' — silvery-white variegated foliage, very neat habit, around 18–20". Perfect against that white wall. Plant 2–3 of these as anchoring shrubs, spaced towards the back of the border. [KJ Note: this is incorrect. This plant grows to be much taller and is more suitable for a hedge]

Hebe 'Heartbreaker' — compact, white-edged foliage with pink new growth, pale lilac flowers in summer. Roughly 18". Place one either side of the palm grouping.

Lavandula angustifolia 'Hidcote' — compact English lavender, dark violet spikes, silver foliage, 18". Two or three plants scattered through the border, they'll knit it together visually.

Suggested perennials:

Agapanthus 'Poppin' Purple' or 'Baby Pete' — dwarf agapanthus, violet-blue, 18–24". Lovely in front of the palms. 3–5 plants.

Hemerocallis 'Stella de Oro' — your taller accent plant, gold-yellow, 24". One or two clumps placed asymmetrically for rhythm. The warm gold will sing against the cooler lilac tones.

Armeria maritima (Sea Thrift) — tight cushion-forming, pink pompom flowers, very low (8–10"). Edge the front of the border with a ribbon of these.

Diascia 'Coral Belle' — soft coral-pink, cascading, 10–14". Tuck in between shrubs for a naturalistic effect.

Salvia nemorosa 'Caradonna' — slim violet-purple spikes, 18". Weave a few of these through the middle zone. Excellent in San Diego's heat.

Claude’s commentary on the design

A few notes on the design logic:

The palms anchor the center and the planting builds out symmetrically but not rigidly from them — a little asymmetry in the hemerocallis placement and the lavender spacing keeps it naturalistic rather than stiff.

The back row (nearest the white wall) uses the larger, more structural shrubs — the pittosporum and hebes. Their variegated silver-green and white-edged foliage will show up beautifully against the white stucco, especially in low morning or evening sun.

The middle zone layers the taller perennials — agapanthus and hemerocallis — with the upright salvia woven through for vertical interest without breaking the 24" ceiling. The golden hemerocallis provides a warm counterpoint to all the cool purples and blues.

The front edge is kept low and soft with the diascia and armeria, which will spill slightly forward and blur the hard border line in a pleasing way.

A practical tip: Given that the soaker system is calibrated for the palms (which like a good soak but reasonable drainage), all the plants I've suggested are broadly compatible — none are bog plants, and all tolerate well-drained to moderately moist conditions. The lavender is the most drought-tolerant; if the border gets very generous water, you might substitute Salvia chamaedryoides (germander sage) for the lavender, which handles more moisture.

Would you like me to suggest quantities for purchasing, or adjust any of the plant choices?

Keith’s observations

I was delighted with Claude’s ability to propose a very appealing planting scheme, with clear logic for the plant choices. I was especially impressed that Claude also produced a diagram of the scheme.

As I have found with previous Claude-related projects, the output is not without errors, e.g., not realizing that the selected pittosporum variant is actually rather tall. So, it’s important that the output is checked for accuracy.

Some of the individual plants seem hard to locate, but I can easily substitute these for varieties with similar habit which are readily available.

Why not try this yourself?

You might not have a border in need of a make over, but you might have another design project where Claude, or another LLM, could help.

If so, give it a whirl and then share with the group what the outcome was.