Garden statues bring a wonderful charm to any landscape, if done tastefully. My personal favorites are medieval figures that emit an air of mystery without coming across as strange or gothic. Perhaps you are having an unspoken competition with your neighbor for who can have the best-looking garden, and your neighbor has placed a roman athlete with missing clothes and body parts. This is your chance to beat him or her for good with a beautiful statue.

But the elements can be harsh on any type of garden statuary, whether the statue wears clothes or not, especially in certain locations and seasons. To protect the investment you have made into your garden's beauty, special precautions should be taken to protect your crowning jewel of your garden and to maintain the beauty of the sculptor's work.

If your statue has been painted, it may need to be placed in an enclosed area. Doing so will offer it much more protection from Mother Nature's storms. The stone and concrete tends to hold up just fine against the weather, but the painted areas take a beating and present that broken, weathered, splotchy look. If that is what you like, go for it. Otherwise, try to keep it protected during stormy seasons.

In your case, the statue needs to be visible for everybody (especially your neighbor) to see, so covering or hiding it is not going to work for you. You can consider coating the statue with a liquid car wax, which should offer sufficient protection from weathering. Be careful though, since car wax tends to leave a white residue if you fail to wipe it off properly.

A more expensive or better solution would be using a water sealer that is designed for concrete or masonry on statues. You should do this once a year for all of your garden statues and especially for statues that hold water as part of their features, including birdbaths and fountains. Follow the directions carefully when you apply a water sealer to your statue. Sunny days offer the best weather conditions for drying the statue once it has been sealed with the water sealer, so make this part of your spring cleaning routine. Wash the statue before you use the sealant though, or you will seal the dirt and grime to your statue all year.

Many gardeners use urns and concrete flower pots in conjunction with their garden statues. These also should be treated with a water sealant, and you need to verify that the urns and flowerpots drain properly. If water builds up it could destroy these items overnight in a quick freeze. If you keep a dish or saucer underneath these pots during the warm months, be sure to remove it before the cold season sets in.

To further protect your garden statue (and to make sure your neighbor sees it every day), it should be placed on a paving stone, a concrete block, or a concrete pavement to protect it from the soil and other ground hazards. Be attentive to your statue's condition, since prevention is the best care you can give it.