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Landscape Design and Construction By Anthony Tesselaar Creating a Peaceful Slice of Home Healing gardens provide benefits to retirement and health care residents — and a growing revenue opportunity for landscape professionals derstand any changes in the marketplace, what kind of plants are needed to accom- modate those changes, and how Tesselaar Plants can help. In the past few years, one change stands I out: a boom in landscaping projects for senior living and health care facilities. De- spite struggles elsewhere in the economy, landscapers tell me opportunities abound in this segment of the market — from hos- pitals to retirement communities to assisted living centers. "In the past 10 years, we've been in- travel the world in search of beauti- ful, easy-care plants. While I often meet with breeders and growers, I also meet with landscape designers, builders and architects so I can un- volved in at least a dozen projects directly related to health care and the aging popu- lation — prior to that, none," said Bruce Zaretsky, co-owner of Zaretsky and Asso- ciates, a landscape design-build firm in Rochester, N.Y. According to the AARP, approximately 1 million Americans live in assisted living facilities, and this number is expected to double by 2030. Baby Boomers represent more than 70 percent of all the financial assets in the United States, and recent sur- veys show they want health care commu- nities that remind them of home rather than institutions. The July 2011 American Society of Landscape Artchitects' Business Quarterly survey asked landscapers about how the aging population has affected business over the past five years. Project types with the most growth included health care design (41.7 percent), assisted living facilities (36.5 percent), active adult/retirement commu- nities (35.9 percent), therapeutic gardens (32 percent) and aging-in-place design (29.2 percent). So when designing landscapes for these areas, here are a few points to keep in mind: Use easy-care plants with season-long interest Those in senior living and health care communities want low-maintenance, tough plants that are reliably colorful and healthy-looking all season long. Residents at the Rolling Fields Elder Care Commu- nity in Conneautville, Pa., for example, love looking at the Flower Carpet roses in the home's Enchanted Garden, since they bloom May through November and are disease, drought and pest resistant. "They love the bright colors and the fullness of the flowers," said Kathy Porter, the home's marketing director. Cooper, the resident St. Bernard at Rolling Fields Elder Care Community in Conneautville, Pa., stands watch next to a bed of Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Scarlet), bred for outstanding heat and humidity resistance. — Image courtesy of Rolling Fields. Raised beds for those in beds or wheelchairs, as well as plants that offer tactile stimulation are two new popular features in health care landscape design. — Image courtesy Zaretsky and Associates. 16 Landscape and Irrigation May/June 2012 Easy-care, season-long bloomers like these Flower Carpet roses fill out quickly to create large blocks of color and re- ward residents with flowers from May through November. Photo provided by Tesselaar Plants www.landscapeirrigation.com