Lawn Mowing Striping - Making a Big League Lawn

Lawn Patterns

If you're looking to make your lawn into a work of art, lawn mowing striping is the easiest way to make a big league lawn. Turf striping is really a matter of creating a design out of bending your grass a certain way. The light that reflects off your grass gives an illusion of different colored stripes (dark and light). The lawn mowing enthusiast must understand this concept first, before they can create impressive striping patterns.

Striping Tools
You need two main tools to make a pattern in your lawn: a lawn mower and a roller. Any lawn mower will work for this activity. The roller does the magic to complete the pattern. You can rent or buy a roller at your local garden center. The roller should be the same width as the cutting blade of your mower. If it is impossible for you to get a roller, you can use other tools like drag mats, lawn sweepers or hand rollers. However, these tools take a lot more time and work to get the desired lawn striping effect.

Striping Technique
Do some initial planning by making out a sketch of how you want your pattern to look. You need to start and end with the same color stripes (light or dark) in your design. This will give your lawn a symmetric look. You must also keep a straight line when mowing. If you get off even a little bit, the rest of your lines will be skewed. On the return sweep with your lawn mower, you need to put your tires on the same path as the last sweep. Make your turns wide and slow to help protect the integrity of your design. If you are lucky you can use a driveway or path to make your turns.

Common Lawn Mowing Patterns

Regular Stripes

Plaid Stripes

Reference: David Mellor