A touch of rocks, a splash of dirt, a sprinkle of plants and a little bit of elbow grease is all it takes to plan and design an amazing crevice garden that will add an amazing mountainous alpine flair to your yard.

Crevice gardens are essentially a type of rock garden. The idea behind a crevice garden is; through the artful placement of rocks, dirt, plants and even moss; to create a scene mimicking that of a craggy mountainous alpine slope. Of course, crevice gardens are open to creative interpretation and designers are free to explore a variety of different looks and flavors as well as flora. Crevice gardens can range greatly in size from a modest little garden with a just a few stones and plants in the corner of a yard to an enormous structure with thousands of stones and specimens winding along a pathway or courtyard.

It is very important that you put a lot of time and thought in the planning and design of your crevice garden. Take a good look at the area that you have set to build the garden and picture in your mind how you would like the structure to look like when all is said and done. If you just start throwing dirt and rock hither and thither…you’re just asking for a big fix.

A crevice garden should be at least 70 cm tall. There are two sides to crevice garden; one should slope gradually, known as the dominant side, and the other one slope should descend gradually and the other a touch more steeply. In both cases, the slopes should be no less than 22º and no greater than 45º so as to allow for water to flow more easily during rain and avoid erosion in your beautiful garden.

On the dominant side, you should think to lay your rocks with a space of between 5 and 15 cm apart but the stones should touch on their edges so that the structure holds in place and doesn’t slide down. In essence, you are left with a mound of dirt with rocks laid on top with spaces in between that can be filled with some more dirt so as to allow for plant growth.

On the steep side of the garden, the rocks should have more of a look of a stone wall with all of the stones fit fairly close together and dug into the supporting mound about 33% of the way. In terms of plants, this will certainly be the more sparse side of the garden with a very exposed look.

In terms of plants, classic gardens will usually have hearty alpine plants and mosses; again, it is left to your interpretation. The important thing to remember is to keep the size of the plants relative to the size of the garden. If you have a 80 cm tall garden then a fig tree might not be prudent.

As it turns out, Canada has the perfect climate for a true crevice garden in the classic sense. If you’re here in Toronto and would like to have a crevice garden professionally designed and constructed in your yard or outside of your business then be sure to give us a call.