Residential Design

Professional Practice Network (PPN) Session

SUN-C05 - The Evolution of the Front Yard: From Display Garden to Multiuse Space

1.25 PDH, LA CES/HSW, AIA/non-HSW, AICP, FL, NY/HSW

Lead Speaker(s)

• 

  Katie Seidenwurm, ASLA

  Landscape Architect/Owner
  Zinnia Design

Speaker(s)

• CS

  Courtney Skybak, ASLA

  Landscape Architect
  Samuel H. Williamson Associates.
• JT

  Jim Taylor, ASLA

  President
  The Lightfoot Planning Group

The suburban front yard, dominated by lawn, has long functioned as a passage from house to street and tidy foreground to the home. This session explores recent trends toward other uses of the front yard: for socializing, recreation, and cultivation, functions historically kept in the backyard.

Learning Objectives:

• Review the history of suburban residential front yard design, explore recent design trends, and learn what is driving those trends.
• Learn ways that homeowners are using small properties to the maximum potential.
• Learn how community governing boards (i.e., HOAs and municipal codes) are reacting to homeowners desires to change their front yards.
• See how these boards are changing their design guidelines to adapt to the homeowners’ requests.