21 House Landscaping Ideas To Bring You Closer To Nature (2024)

Never underestimate the impact of nature—especially when creating an outdoor oasis. Whether you’re in search of minimalist desert palettes or lush coastal canopies, these house landscaping ideas are sure to inspire a verdant makeover with staying power.

LUSH LANDSCAPE

This Kiawah Island, South Carolina, vacation home authored by architects Ken Pursley and Craig Dixon nestles into the coastal property’s canopy of oaks and palmettos, creating the feeling that “you’ve gone to this exotic hidden gem in the woods,” says the latter. Existing natives such as yaupon holly, magnolia and cedar were replicated over the course of landscape architect Paul Freeman’s efforts. Fresh additions include windmill palms to boost the site’s tropical verve.

QUIET PATH

Arched steel doors by R.G. Ironworks lend luminosity to a vestibule of this Atlanta home by residential designer William T. Baker and designer Dana Lynch. Swaths of autumn ferns and little gem magnolias—finessed by landscape designer William McMullen of DIG Gardenworks—flank a path composed of FireRock Building Materials concrete pavers. The Hinkley gooseneck sconce is from Ferguson Bath, Kitchen & Lighting Gallery.

HIDDEN TREASURES

An arbor, twined with a fragrant pink jasmine vine, “was designed to narrow the access point to a secret garden, creating a hide-and-reveal effect,” explains landscape architect Nick Dean. The outdoor area reminds the owners of their travels through the English countryside.

OPEN-AIR

Double doors with an Alaskan yellow cedar interior from Dynamic Fenestration connect the primary bedroom to a private terrace bordered by Mexican feather grass, which was installed by Fowlkes, Norman & Associates, Inc. Landscape. A Kettal Basket chair from Smink is perfectly positioned outside for river-gazing.

DESERT DREAMSCAPE

Landscape designer Dennis Canedy allowed the desert surroundings to shine, using native plantings in the courtyard of this Paradise Valley home created by architect C.P. Drewett, designer Mara Green and general contractor Rich Brock.

IN BLOOM

Sherwin-Williams’ White Heron covers the front façade of a Palm Beach residence renovated by interior designer Kelly Anthony and general contractor Jason Willoughby. Behind the Podocarpus hedge and wall of jasmine vines, landscape architect Dustin M. Mizell added bougainvillea trees for a splash of color.

SECRET GARDEN

While her husband fell hard for the building’s bones, for Allison Smith it was the grounds—“beautiful, private, lush and green,” she says—that captivated her. The mounded shrubs—mostly boxwoods—give structure and formality to the gardens, which now have a more free-flowing feel thanks to visionary updates by landscape architect Marley Fields.

CASUAL CONTEMPORARY

Landscape architects Russell Greey and Clayton Miller took cues from this home’s contemporary design elements when creating the landscape design, which highlights drifts of deer grass along the walkways, rhythmic plantings of agaves and succulents in garden beds, and a four-sided, negative-edge water feature that displays a sculptural cactus, “presenting the illusion of the prickly pear floating on water,” Greey says.

FRESH OUTLOOK

In the front yard of interior designer Jackie Armour’s Tequesta home, Dix Landscape created a lush bucolic setting and revitalized the freshwater pond, where Polywood Adirondack chairs share ringside seats. Benjamin Moore’s Super White brightens the exterior; Marlboro Blue is on the shutters. Near the front entrance is Ballard Designs’ Miles Redd Bermuda garden bench.

KEEP IT SIMPLE

Designer Jason Arnold transformed this early-20th-century home in Nashville’s Belle Meade neighborhood by preserving its historical charm—while also giving the “stone cottage,” as he describes it, a modernized look. Landscape architect John Thompson followed suit with a simplified plant palette, adding clipped boxwoods to anchor the architecture and frame the entry garden. New flowering dogwoods will bring spring blooms.

FITTING IN

Willow oaks shade a renovated Charlotte home by architect Lindsay Hance McCullough, who extended the structure’s original volume with a high-ceilinged addition and covered porch at the rear. “The flat roof planes help to tie it all together, so it looks like it was all done at once,” she explains. Landscape architect Laurie Durden’s fresh plantings, including dwarf yaupon holly and fescue grass, ensure the property fits in with its neighborhood.

GRAND ENTRANCE

A stately Palm Beach County residence by interior designer Kristen Rivoli has a lush gated entryway by landscape designer Nelson Logal. “‘Manicured Florida’ is what I call it,” he says. To allow for easy maintenance, Logal heavily outfitted the area with native species such as foxtail palms, green island ficus, sea grapes and podocarpus.

RELAX + REFLECT

A trio of RH Modern sun loungers topped with cushions upholstered in a gray Perennials fabric line up poolside. Landscape architect Lindsay Buck restored the property’s native prairie landscaping with wildflowers and grasses.

OUTDOOR OASIS

Architect Ken Newberry maintained the largest portion of the lot possible for outdoor living and wrapped the architecture around it. Janus et Cie Amari rattan armchairs surround a fire pit overlooking landscaping designed in collaboration with landscape designer Serena Gibson and installed by Kainer & Kainer Landscape Architecture. Cameron Builders, Inc. installed the pool and hardscaping.

NO PASSPORT REQUIRED

Architect Thad Truett and general contractor Chip Evans employed stucco and tumbled Texas Cordova Shell Stone to enhance the Mediterranean stylings of this Sea Island, Georgia, home. Playing to that concept, landscape designer Alex Smith incorporated an old specimen olive tree that appears as at home in the entry courtyard as it would in Southern Europe.

A STEP UP

The home follows the slope of the hillside. Landscape designer Richard Hartlage chose native plantings, installed by Nussbaum Group, to further tie the house to the site.

VEGGIE TALES

Embracing their love for cooking at home, owners Domonique and Grant Matthews decided to forgo the typical front lawn in favor of a vegetable and herb garden by landscape designer Jared Vermeil. Romantic, yet also practical, the free-flowing planting design suited their new abode’s connection with the outdoors.

STRATEGIC PLANNING

“It was important to have a blend of materials that felt comfortable in this forest environment, but also to create a bit of a manicured oasis,” architect Christopher Kempel says of the landscape design created by landscape architect Brian Bainnson for this house in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. “As the landscaping gets closer to the house, it gets more structured. As it gets farther from the house, it gets more natural and sort of blends away.”

MEET IN THE MIDDLE

Landscape designer Nikila Rigby Ellis planted a quartet of olive trees in the outdoor dining area, fostering the property’s Provençal spirit. The idyllic spot is furnished with a Janus et Cie table and CB2 armchairs with a Twin Eagles grill located just steps away. Illuminating the guest house’s door is a Bevolo lantern.

ITALIAN INSPIRED

Romantic, European-style gardens with wide gravel pathways are punctuated by an allée of crepe myrtles, an antique stone fountain and a 17th-century marble urn and pedestal—from Chateau Domingue—that once adorned the courtyard of a villa on Italy’s Amalfi Coast.

MOMENT OF SOLITUDE

Scattered throughout the property are small, artful seating areas, such as one in the front yard centered around a fountain. “The ranges of colors and textures available to us through various plant materials creates endless possibilities,” landscape architect Pamela Burton points out.

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