Have you seen pictures of those wonderful commercial gardens? Don’t they look absolutely amazing! And then you look at your backyard or frontyard and get extremely sad because it’s filled with overgrown grass and weed. So in order to give life to your garden, you learned a bit of gardening, and maybe even grew some potted plants indoors. You feel like you are ready to do some landscaping and start making your own garden. But you run into a bit of a problem.
How to design a garden? You might be plagued by this question because you don’t really know much other than a bit of gardening. There are a lot of aspects to designing a garden. How it suits the house, what theme you want the design to reflect, and many more! The world of design can be confusing. But not to worry, I shall guide you on how to start designing your dream garden. Read on and see the tips on how to design a garden.
Key Takeaways
- When preparing for your garden design, always plan, clean, de-weed, and edge your garden beds properly to make them suitable to plant.
- Different types of gardens require a different approach to designing them.
- Always have tools handy to maintain the look of your garden and keep it looking fresh.
- It is your garden so you can design it to fit the aesthetics of your home and the gardening area.
Preparation for the Garden
Before you start designing, there are some things you need to do to prepare your garden for the design you want to implement. So let’s look at the preparatory steps you need to design your garden.
Planning
A well-thought-out plan means that you are halfway there to completing your garden design. The planning stage is important because it determines what you can and can’t do with your garden. First thing, take all the necessary measurements of the spot you want to plant your garden. Then draw a rough sketch of where the plants will be and where you want the decoration to sit. And then of course, you have to think about the path of the sunlight over your garden. With that in mind, you can decide on what type of garden you want to grow.
With that, you now know where you want to work on the garden and how much space you have for it. Then it is all about the budget, and how much you want to spend to design your garden. The next step is to choose the garden decorations according to your budget. I would suggest not following a theme because it restricts your design. Also midway through you might realize that it doesn’t fit with how the surrounding looks either. With a rough design in mind, let’s move on to prepping your garden.
Cleaning
It’s time to clean! All that overgrown grass, fallen leaves from surrounding trees, and trash need to go. You would want your garden to look as neat as possible. To do this, cut the grass at an even length so that it looks sharp and helps the garden look even better.
Weeding
After cleaning, now it’s time to deep clean. Getting rid of the weeds in your garden area is a must because you don’t want to plant where there are a lot of weeds. Weeds are like pests as they take up a lot of space and spread their seed all over where you want to grow. So it is important to get rid of the weeds.
Edging garden beds
After the weeding, it’s time to set up the garden beds. You want to use a flat-edged shovel to mark where you want your garden bed will be and it adds a neat area for you to add your soil for planting. After adding the soil, add mulch to your soil as well. Not only will this make your garden pop, but it also makes sure of no weeds growing on the place you are planting. Make sure it is no more than 3-4 inches and not over where the plant will grow from. To do that, just create a circular area around where you want the plant to be.
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Types of Gardens and How to Design Them
With your garden set up and all the plants you want growing in the soil, it’s time to start designing around them. What your design depends on is the type of garden you have. This is because different plants need different types of care to be given so your design shouldn’t just look good, but also help the plants grow. So let’s see how to design different types of gardens.
Flower gardens
With flower gardens, what you want is to complement the colors of the flower that you want to grow. And you also want it to look as natural as possible. This is why when I plant a flower garden, I make it in a way that the flowers look like how they would look in nature. But you can also make a coordinated combination. For example, a garden filled with a variety of different colored petunias to make a pattern.
What you also want to do is to make sure the flowers like the sun. Some flowers like the hibiscus and daylilies need a lot of sunlight while fuchsia and violas need shade to grow properly. That’s why you can grow plants with large leaves that provide a natural shade for the flowers or create a little roofing to give the plants some shade. It all depends on how you want it to look. And you can arrange a sitting area to have your afternoon snack and get in touch with some sweet-smelling flowers in your garden.
Vegetable gardens
The thing you want when designing a vegetable garden is practicality. Of course, you want to make it look as good as possible whenever someone sees it. That is why for me, vegetable gardens have to look clean. Divide the vegetables accordingly, using little fences as a divider. Another thing I like to do is add a little nameplate on a stick so the vegetables look ordered and organized.
What I think is a cool addition to a vegetable garden is an open roof, especially one with a retractable roof. You can design the vegetable garden with some climbers hanging around the roof to give the garden a certain aesthetic. Some climbing roses or Japanese wisterias look lovely on the arches of the vegetable garden entrance, or you could go green with some English ivies to match a possible cabbage patch.
Fruit gardens
Much like a vegetable garden, fruit gardens are more about practicality. The simple reason is fruit trees need a lot more space between them. So a fruit garden you would need 8 feet distance between them. And you would need a lot of space for how big some get too! That is why I suggest dwarf apple trees and Japanese maple because they don’t grow to be too large.
You can design the garden with dividers to match trees. The design with fruit gardens is to make the tree the centerpiece and let it shine with ornaments. A big fruit tree will provide natural shade so you can arrange some sitting area under the tree or have a little picnic under a cherry blossom tree.
Woodland gardens
Woodland gardens are like a walk through nature with overgrown greenery. A woodland garden would not look good without trees to make it look like a walk through the forest. Maple and birch trees would make for good trees, especially how they look in the fall. And then for the entrance, you can use an old wooden or iron gate to give it an air of mystery. Then for your walk through nature, you can make pathways with flat white bricks to guide you through the garden. Along the pathway, you can line up with different types of woodland flowers like anemones, primroses, foxgloves, and other types of wildflowers.
To give the shade, use evergreen plants like ferns and sage to give that forest vibe through your garden. Woodland gardens are a big design so you should be a little more experienced with such a project.
Indoor gardens
Indoor gardens are unique because they take less time to prep. Get some pots and plant some flowers or climbers inside your home. And you can design it to reflect the aesthetics of the room with custom-colored pots or fancy pot holders. What you want to be careful of is how much sun indoor plants like money plants or spider plants because direct sunlight can harm them so keep away from windows.
Rooftop gardens
Nothing is better than having a rooftop garden against the city landscape in the background. Climbers are very good to give that overgrown concrete jungle vibe. Install little supports for climbers to grow and hang on the side of the roof. Also, if you want to plant fruits or flowers, add wind blocks. Otherwise, the flowers and fruit might get blown away by a strong gust.
Tool for Your Garden
After designing your dream garden, it’s all about maintenance of the garden to keep it fresh and stop it from being overgrown. That is why you must need some gardening tools to help with the design of your garden.
- Pruner
- Garden knife
- Trowel
- Shovel
- Rake
- Grass cutter
- Weed puller
- Hoe
- Edging tool
FAQs
Designing a garden is not hard, but building your design might be difficult if it’s complicated or themed. That is why I suggest making the design as simple as possible to make the plants shine.
You can plant anything suitable for your climate and season. I suggest growing seasonal plants because of how well they can survive and match the seasonal design as well.
If you want to do a big project or a themed design and are not confident, you can seek professional help. They will give the garden a very professional look.
Final Thoughts
And there you have it, how to design a garden. We looked at how to prepare for the design. We also looked at the different types of gardens and I gave some personal suggestions for your design. At the end of the day, it is all up to you how you want to design the garden because your house and my house are completely different. What would work in mine would not work in yours. Therefore, plan how you want it to look. And if not, you can always hire someone to help with your design.
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