Goodbye February and welcome to March! With spring just a few weeks away and warmer weather creeping into our forecasts, we're looking ahead to landscape design projects. This week on Down the Garden Path, landscape designers Matthew Dressing and Joanne Shaw answer your (many!) hardscaping questions.

Tune into this week's podcast and get Your Hardscaping Questions Answered.

Matt and Joanne fielded a record 22 questions during their hour-long show.

They start by answering the basics:

• What does “hardscaping” mean?
• And by contrast, what does “softscaping” or landscaping mean?
• It is all about the base! Are limestone screenings a good base to put down under paving stones?
• What are some of the other base options?
• Is there a best way to put sand in between patio stones? Is there "better" sand to use?

Matt and Joanne also answered listener questions about:

• the use of plastic, fabric and mulch in gardens
• low voltage lighting best practices
• the best trees you can choose for privacy
• fruit trees and their suggestions for choosing one for your garden

About Your Hosts

Each week on Down The Garden Path podcast, professional landscape designers Joanne Shaw and Matthew Dressing discuss down-to-earth tips and advice for your plants, gardens and landscapes.

As the owner of Down2Earth Landscape Design, Joanne Shaw has been designing beautiful gardens for homeowners east of Toronto for over a decade.

And Matthew Dressing is a horticulturist and landscape designer. He owns Natural Affinity Garden Design, a landscape design and garden maintenance firm servicing Toronto and the Eastern GTA. Together, Joanne and Matthew do their best to bring you interesting, relevant and helpful topics. Their goal is to help you keep your garden as low maintenance as possible.