What's Your Garden Design Style? (2024)

Gardening

Landscaping

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Jamie McIntosh

What's Your Garden Design Style? (1)

Jamie McIntosh

Jamie McIntosh has written about gardening and special occasion flowers for the Spruce since 2011. She has more than 20 years of experience caring for flowers and plants. She was a feature writer for Organic Gardening at Suite101, where she won awards for her writing.

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Updated on 10/22/21

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What's Your Garden Design Style? (2)

Designing a great landscape is about more than buying a flat of flowers and sticking a few shrubs around your foundation. A thoughtful garden design may pay for itself, adding 10 percent or more to the value of your home. Here are seven garden styles that will have you dreaming of spring.

  • 01 of 07

    Cottage Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (3)

    At the nursery, you're like a kid in a candy shop. You can't decide between the vivacious trumpet lilies or the lush fuchsias, so you put three of each in your cart. Your dream garden is a bit madcap, always blooming, and full of fragrance and life. A cottage garden in full bloom is exuberant, to say the least. Populate it with dramatic tall accent flowers such as delphiniums, foxgloves, and hollyhocks. Fill in all the gaps with romantic heirloom roses, cheerful daisies, and breezy baby's breath. Add a couple of vines, such as clematis or wisteria, and you have a great foundation for your retreat.

  • 02 of 07

    Outdoor Garden Room

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (4)

    Think of all of the best elements of your favorite retreat: candles, pillows, blankets or throws, and comfortable seating. Now add fresh air, flowers, butterflies, and birdsong. An outdoor room doesn't need to be elaborate; it can be as simple as demarcating an area with a trellis and installing a bench with some cushions that encourage you to put your feet up and stay awhile. A container garden makes it easy to switch out fading plants regularly, ensuring that your outdoor room stays in bloom all season.

  • 03 of 07

    Woodland Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (5)

    The best things come to those who wait, and the shady garden especially embodies that sentiment. Spring is a glorious season in any garden, but especially so in the woodland garden, where azaleas, rhododendrons, primroses, and bleeding hearts put on a show. There are even butterflies that you can draw to your shaded landscape if you install plants such as bugbane or goat's beard. If your site is wet, choose from a host of flowering bog plants to light up your space.

  • 04 of 07

    Formal Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (6)

    If your house is always clutter-free, and your idea of a perfect palette is monochrome or two-tone, a formal garden might suit your garden style. Symmetry, simplicity, and order are hallmarks of the formal flower garden. Some formal gardens are lacking in flowers, but a flowering plant with a mounding habit such as lavender is perfectly suitable in a formal landscape. Flowers that can be trained into standards, especially roses, are most at home in a formal garden design.

    Continue to 5 of 7 below

  • 05 of 07

    Wildflower Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (7)

    Can you name the top 10 birds that visit your landscape? Can you distinguish the beneficial insects in your yard from the pests? If respecting and preserving native wildlife is a priority for you, then you should plant some wildflowers as a foundation for your natural habitat. If you think wild means weedy, get to know some of the new, highly floriferous coneflowers such as 'Cheyenne Spirit.' Other highly ornamental native wildflowers include columbine, fleabane, and penstemon. No matter which flowers you choose, stick with organic gardening methods that are gentle on wildlife.

  • 06 of 07

    Front Yard Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (8)

    You dedicate many hours to your prize flowers each week, so why hide them away in the back yard? A front yard garden is a gift to the neighborhood and the whole community; a seasonal show that brings new delights each month. Be bold, and plant a large swath of giant sunflowers with annual morning glories twining up their stems. If the only sun on your property is in the front yard, mix it up with a flowering vegetable garden. If you dabble in seed starting, you can fill up your entire plot with easy annuals such as zinnias, cosmos, and bachelor's buttons.

  • 07 of 07

    Rustic Garden

    What's Your Garden Design Style? (9)

    If you get excited when you hear words and phrases such as flea market, country charm, cast off, and salvage yard, then rustic garden design is for you. The theme and inspiration for your rustic garden can come from many sources, which is part of its charm: your landscape will be like your fingerprint, unique to you. You may start with an assemblage of vintage license plates, a reclaimed garden gate, heirloom farm implements, or a repurposed chandelier. Add some casual, low-maintenance flowers such as daylilies, yarrow, iris, and clematis. These plants will establish quickly, and their classic good looks will lend a timeless appearance to your rustic garden.

What's Your Garden Design Style? (2024)

FAQs

What is the style of garden? ›

Formal gardens:

In this garden, the design is stiff as everything is done in a straight and narrow way. In such gardens, everything is planned in straight lines. Square and rectangular geometric forms are repeated in the various hardscaping features of formal gardens.

What is landscape design style? ›

Landscape design is a centuries-old art form that encompasses the meticulous planning, thoughtful design, and skillful execution of outdoor spaces. Its purpose is to craft an environment that is both visually appealing and cohesive.

What are the 10 principles of garden design? ›

10 Principles of Garden Design
  • Unity. Unity is the principle of creating a cohesive and harmonious design throughout your garden. ...
  • Balance. Balance is the principle of creating a visually satisfying composition in the garden. ...
  • Proportion. ...
  • Scale. ...
  • Rhythm. ...
  • Contrast. ...
  • Focal Point. ...
  • Texture.
Apr 5, 2023

What is traditional garden style? ›

Symmetry and Balance: Traditional gardens often mirror plantings on either side of a central point, creating a balanced and harmonious effect. This could be around a central garden feature, such as a statue or water fountain.

What is modern garden style? ›

Contemporary gardens

Crisp, clean lines are an intrinsic part of contemporary design, which can be applied to either small or larger gardens. Equally important is the use of space, geometric layout and the absence of too many fussy details and clutter.

What is garden design called? ›

Landscape Designer is a term which is nowadays interchangeable with Garden Designer but completely different to a Landscape Architect. To become a Landscape Architect you'll need a different set of skills and qualifications.

What are the 5 basic elements of landscape design? ›

An aesthetic landscape design incorporates five key elements: line, form, texture, color and scale.

What are the four different types of landscapes? ›

There are many different types of landscapes, including:
  • Coastal landscapes.
  • Riverine landscapes.
  • Desert landscapes.
  • Karst landscapes.
  • Mountain landscapes.
May 24, 2021

How many types of gardens are there? ›

The five garden types include Woodland Gardens, Rock Gardens, Water Gardens, Herb and Vegetable gardens and speciality gardens. A garden, in its simplest form, is a planned green space that can be set up for various purposes like to add aesthetic value to the property, cultivation, recreation, etc.

How do you layout a garden design? ›

As a general rule, put tall veggies toward the back of the bed, mid-sized ones in the middle, and smaller plants in the front or as a border. Consider adding pollinator plants to attract beneficial insects that can not only help you get a better harvest, but will also prey on garden pests.

What is the basic pattern in garden design? ›

Grid lines drawn at 45 degrees can be used as a guideline to design the garden. Rectangular themes are the most popular and widely used. They are adapted to give a formal look to the garden. Long or narrow gardens can be easily divided into even sections using this particular theme.

What is the rule of 3 in landscaping? ›

Three plants creates balance

If you have enough space, group them in an equilateral triangle. This looks particularly good with mounding or vertical plants. Be sure to leave some space between the plants, especially if they are three different kinds.

What is Mediterranean garden style? ›

Mediterranean gardens are designed to respond to the hot climate. They are characterized by shady retreats to escape the blazing summer sun, cooling water features, outdoor seating areas, drought tolerant plants, and gravel to replace water-thirsty lawns.

What is a Dutch style garden? ›

The Dutch garden was the description given to a particular type of rectangular flower garden space, often enclosed within hedges or walls, even if part of a larger garden or parkland.

What is a cottage garden style? ›

The cottage garden is a distinct style that uses informal design, traditional materials, dense plantings, and a mixture of ornamental and edible plants. English in origin, it depends on grace and charm rather than grandeur and formal structure.

What is garden aesthetic called? ›

Gardencore. Gardencore is an aesthetic centered around gardens, this aesthetic is closely related to Cottagecore and bloomcore. Gardencore also features greenhouses or Victorian-style gardens, the gardens don't always have to be complicated and large, they can be small as well.

Are there different types of gardening? ›

Gardening can be more than just planting flowers. You can create several different types of gardens: cultivate a themed garden, choose plants that attract butterflies, establish a backyard pond, or even grow your own food! Plant flowers that butterflies will love. If space is limited, grow plants in containers.

What is garden aesthetics? ›

It involves the use of plants and other hardscaping elements like planters, rocks, and fountains in order to make the space more attractive. If you want to master beautiful landscaping, it is important that you follow some aesthetic tips which will help you achieve your goal easily and effectively.

What are the different shapes of garden? ›

Also, various shapes like circles and rectangles can be used for interesting effects. When compared with others, the Curved Corner Sites are the most difficult to design. Gravels and boulders can be used to create striking effects. Plants such as Phormiums and Yuccas can be used to punctuate the spaces.

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