"Rescue Me" t-shirt from Fleurty Girl benefiting the Gulf Coast Recovery

Featured Designer, Chuck Edwards of Garden City, ID

April was all about social networking for the garden design community. I know Landscapedia will never be a Facebook for garden folks, but I do think there's a good reason to make Landscapedia more social. So without further delay, here are the major changes.

Landscapedia's Response the BP Oil Spill

Landscapedia is based in New Orleans, so as you can imagine the BP oil spill is hitting in my backyard. Read how you can help on the Gulf Coast Recovery page.

Facebook + Landscapedia

This month, Facebook gave websites a way to integrate "Like" into their websites. You see it on sites like IMDB.com and Pandora.com, among others. If you run across a plant or designer you like, be sure to give them the thumbs up! If you are a designer, get as many people as you can to give you a thumbs up. This puts your portfolio out into the 450 million member FB community. Oh, you don't have to be a Landscapedia member to "Like" them.

Follow Designers and Businesses

If you are inspired by a designer, you can follow them. The awesome part is that when they add a new design to their portfolio, you'll get an email letting you know. Cool, huh? For businesses, Groups have been renamed Follow, to keep it more consistent across all pages. You still get emails when someone updates a page or forum for a business. Oh, follows now count towards Featured Designer selection!

Member Suggestions (beta)

If you don't know what beta means, it means that I'm testing this feature. I LOVE this. For years, Landscapedia has recommended plants based on your location. That was great when Landscapedia was just plants and projects, but the site has moved on. That old featured didn't. Now, you can get Suggestions on Designers you may like, people you may know, plants to explore and groups to follow. As you add friends and suggestions, you'll get new ones every day. View your suggestions and let me know what you think. I hope you like this as much as I do.

I'll continue to refine this feature based on your feedback, but I hope it helps you explore Landscapedia and discover plants, gardens and people you'll love too.

A New Visitor Record

Landscapedia set a new traffic record in April. I've been putting a lot of work into make the site friendlier to search engines and visitors, so I'm happy to see it was time well spent. Plus with the new social features, people are staying on the site longer and exploring more plants, designers and groups. Since the site started, there have been almost 250k visits and over half a million pages viewed. We have visitors from almost every country except 10, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa. It's nice to take a view of things from this angle to justify the endless hours I spend on the site . . . lol

Featured Designer

The featured designer this month is Chuck Edwards of Breckon Land Design in Garden City, ID. Be sure to follow his portfolio to get updates on his latest designs.