A well-designed front yard landscape can transform your home’s curb appeal. It can also provide a welcoming, versatile setting where you can relax and enjoy the view. Here are some of our favorite landscaping and gardening ideas for creating the best front yard on the block.
Meditative Oasis
Take time to chill in this peaceful, Asian-inspired garden. Hardscape elements reinforce the style—and keep down the maintenance—of a garden. A restrained wooden fence with a minimalist detail at the top emphasizes the Asian influences in this garden.
Carefully selected varieties reinforce the clean lines of this garden. Bonus? Fewer plants also equal less daily tending of the garden. Mulch isn’t finicky, retains water, and keeps down weeds, which reduces the need for upkeep. Once established, evergreens, including the midheight versions at the back of the fence and the dwarf varieties closer to the pathway, tend to need very little regular care.
In place of hard-to-please plants, garden ornaments like this graceful statue fill in gaps in a landscape and add visual interest.
Video: Front Yard Design Tips
Hardscaping and plant choices are equally as important when it comes to front yard design. See five secrets to a gorgeous landscape, as well as inspiration for your front yard landscaping project.
Grand and Graceful
Shrubs and trees combine for striking, expansive back or front yard landscaping. A smattering of river rock provides an informal but distinct edging between the garden bed and lawn.
Gracefully arching shrubs such as willow and cryptomeria keep the garden distinctly low-key. Reliable shrubs and trees can provide more than just a basic green color palette; here, vibrant autumnal tones liven up the landscape. An investment in trees and shrubs pays off in more ways than just landscape interest: The two also offer visual interest during wintertime when perennials have died back.
Shrubs such as willow can be formally shaped, or left to grow at will, eliminating the need for constant trimming.
Brilliant Canvas
Vibrant colors disguise the ease of care behind the plants in this front yard landscaping. Ornamental grasses such as Japanese forest grass are steadfast when it comes to low-care front yard landscaping plants. They offer amazing foliage, need little hand-holding, and withstand harsh weather.
A flagstone path—which requires no care except a good sweep—flows from one end to the other of the narrow side yard. To create a truly low-maintenance garden, limit plants to those that need little TLC and to those that can take the conditions of the space’s microclimate, such as these coral bells. After the first year or two, large deciduous trees, such as this maple, offer structure without demanding additional garden space.
5 Front Yard Landscaping Secrets
Your front yard is the first thing people see as they’re driving by. Follow these five tips for your best front yard ever.
A Little Nook in the Woods
Carved out in a corner, this landscaping idea for a front yard garden showcases fuss-free plants and trees. Larger plants and trees occupy more space in a garden, effectively decreasing the number of plants needed to fill a space. Here, a white pine dominates against a wooden fence.
Transitioning between tall plants and groundcovers is essential for any landscape, and low-maintenance gardens are no different. A globe blue spruce bridges the divide between the path and the trees behind it. Choose accents that involve little effort, too, such as solar-powered landscape lighting. A mostly monochromatic color palette is soothing to the eye and easy to create for nearly any gardener.
Lungwort and ferns offer hardy growth patterns with little TLC.
Bountiful Bed
A congenial grouping of perennials and annuals dresses up a narrow flower bed in this front yard. A no-maintenance garden doesn’t mean the plantings have to be boring. You can make a distinct color impact by adding dahlias or other heat-resistant, summer-flowering bulbs. Annuals provide dashes of color during the summer without having to worry about prepping the plants for winter. Bachelor’s button and petunias both fit the bill in this narrower bed.
Structural plants such as ornamental grasses provide a play of color and maintain visual interest during autumn and fall. Maintenance is easier with garden beds that are accessible from both sides. Otherwise, add pavers through the bed at regular intervals to make weeding and deadheading easier. A defined edge that uses materials (even simple rubber tubing) to prevent grass and weeds from entering the garden bed can save hours of tending.
The Grass Is Greener
A front yard landscaping nook relies on a soothing and low-key setup. While the lines and shapes of plants offer visual interest, hardscape materials provide a decorative element, as evidenced by the curving edge of this gravel walk. Multiple materials supply varied layers in a landscape; try mixing a solid surface with loose gravel. In place of plants that overwhelm with color, two sleekly styled chairs and accent pillows create a focal point.
Striking leaves from canna and New Zealand flax stand out against the otherwise green plants. Plant and go: That’s one of the primary reasons to love ornamental grasses, including sedges; they grow vigorously in summer and maintain their shape during winter.
Beyond the Garden Gate
A front yard landscaping full of grass may seem like less effort than adding ornamental plantings, but this pretty yard proves otherwise. Research is important when it comes to plant selection; choose hardy varieties that won’t mind being close to heavily trafficked areas, such as these daylilies lining the sidewalk.
Containers add bright notes of color, and, if the blooms fade, plants can easily be replaced with another round of annuals. A fence provides a tidy border between the single row of daylilies and more diverse plantings closer to the house. A lush, planted front yard requires less care over the long term than a lawn. No weekly mowing!
Pebbles and Plantings
This landscaping idea for a front yard relies on no-fuss design and pretty plant accents. Dark gray pebbles surround paving stones for a no-mow, easy-care landscape accent. A series of irregularly placed, large-scale pavers offers a minimalist path.
Instead of depending on edging such as mulch that needs to be replaced every season, slim stones provide a solid boundary. Large swaths of a few carefully selected native plants such as coneflower, Liatris, and black-eyed susan, as well as ornamental grass, keep the planting uncomplicated.
Conifers at the back edge of the yard offer year-round color and visual interest.
How to Tie Your Front Yard and Backyard Together
Although they don’t necessarily need to match, your front yard and backyard need to have some design thread running through them to feel intentional and stylized. Learn easy ways to create a cohesive look with your landscaping.
How to Update Your Front Yard on a Budget
If you're looking for quicker ways to update your front yard look that are also easier on your budget, take the DIY route. Try simple projects like laying a narrow gravel path using affordable pea pebbles or forego that and cover with mulch instead; hanging baskets with unique flowers or greenery; decorating around your porch with topiaries or lining it with flower containers or window boxes. For an impactful yet little-to-no-effort swap, add benches, create an actual rock garden, or add a medium to big size rock feature—you can get the latter off the internet, customized with your house number or family last name; or find more generic, budget-friendly ones in garden or home stores.