Edging is an excellent way to define specific areas of your yard, garden, or other landscaping project. They set a definite border between one section and the next, they visually accent the plants, paving, or lawn, and they keep unwanted weeds or other vegetation out of a specific area. While there are many options for edging materials – wire, metal, plastic, stone, cement, and brick, brick is a popular choice for its coloring and longevity. Wood does not last long, stones can be difficult to arrange in an effective barrier, and many people do not like the look of metal fencing, no matter how short, around their garden or lawn. Even limiting yourself to this one medium, brick, for edging material, there are many brick edging ideas you can incorporate into your landscape design.
Just browsing at your local home improvement store will give you many brick edging ideas and inspirations. There are many colors available among bricks, and with new innovations in the manufacture of bricks, there are many different shapes in which you can obtains bricks for use in your landscape edging. Some specially-designed bricks feature interlocking connectors to quickly connect your brocks so that they stay together and are very effective at creating a barrier for unwanted vegetation – for instance to keep grass way from your rosebush or to keep weeds out of your vegetable garden. However, these specially designed brocks come at a cost – quite literally. They can require several times as much money than using a simpler brick design, but can save you hours of work in putting together connected brick edging without using mortar to cement the bricks together.
Handmade bricks are another specific brick edging consideration, one that may or may not be available at your local hardware store. There are less than half a dozen handmade brickmakers in the United States, and their products can cost a bit more than regularly manufactured bricks. However, they will give a very unique look to your brick edging, and may inspire additional brick edging ideas all on their own.
Even if you are using just basic-shaped bricks, there are a myriad of ways in which you can arrange them to personalize the brick edging you put around your landscaping projects. You can lay them end to end, or stand them up on end. You can even get creative and stagger or place the bricks at an angle. Consider that bricks can come in beveled or rounded shapes as well as the traditional rectangular shape, and hundreds of brick edging ideas come to mind. Indeed, there seems to be no end to the brick edging ideas available today to gardeners, landscapers, and homeowners.
If the area where you are putting in brick edging is going to be well-traversed, such as a pathway, or will be subject to large amounts of water, such as near a drain, or is just on uneven ground, you may want to consider joining the bricks with mortar. This also makes them a gapless barrier against unwanted vegetation, just like interlocking brick designs, for much less. Of course, much more work is involved in mortaring bricks together and drying time must be considered as well. However, a mortared brick edging design will stay together and last much longer, and if done well, will look much better than a brick edging arrangement that is not cemented together in any way.
No matter what brick edging ideas inspire you, there are many ways to use the common brick material to make very personal, very aesthetically pleasing, and very effective borders for your landscaping projects.
