Small Garden Design Ideas

In a small garden, following a few key principles when planning and planting can help your garden look bigger and feel less cluttered.Whether you have a small garden or a small patio, there are plenty of ways to enhance your space. Taking the time to choose a color scheme, choosing and repeating plants that bloom throughout the month, or using design tricks like adding focal points can make a big impact. For limited budgets, consider using gravel instead of a walkway or lawn. This gives plants more space in a small space. Install simple lights yourself or, if you prefer a small vegetable garden, sow lettuce in containers or grow fast-growing plants like spring radishes and short, fast-growing carrot varieties like 'Nantes 2.'

1. Get the Landscaping-Planting Ratio Right

When planning your landscape garden, get the balance of planting and landscaping right to make your small garden look great. Garden designs for small gardens should aim for a ratio of about 50 percent planting and furniture to 50 percent paving or decking. This will help create a patio that is easy on the eye without being too crowded.

2. Use cool colors

Choosing the right colors will make your garden look bigger. Colors from the cool side of the color wheel, like blue and purple, appear farther away, while warm colors like red and orange make them look closer. So, choosing a cool plant palette will create the impression that your garden is larger than it is.

3. Create Height in Narrow Borders

Narrow borders can feel restrictive and tricky to plant, but using plants that are a little taller can make them feel more substantial. Use tall bulbs like alliums, agapanthus, or lilies, which will add height without taking up too much ground space. Obelisks planted with climbers like sweet peas will add height without growing too wide.

4. Combine seating and storage

A small back garden can be a great place to store seating that can double as storage space, or create seating in your design. Use a corner bench to save space for a table in the center of your patio, or place seating against a border.

5. Use long-season planting

A small space doesn't have the space to have plants that are only interesting for a short period of the year, so choose varieties with a long blooming season. Good options include repeat-blooming roses, such as Rosa 'Flower Carpet Amber,' which blooms for eight months. Rosa 'Lady of Shallot,' a shrub rose, blooms from June to October. Other long-blooming perennials include Erigeron garwinskianus, Erysium 'Bowles Mauve' and hardy geraniums, many of which bloom all summer long.

6. Plant a hanging plant

Using hanging plants is an inexpensive way to add greenery to a border or shed wall. Plant them with bedding plants, ferns (in shade), trailing alpines or herbs. Alternatively, plant vegetables with shallow roots, such as salad leaves or spinach, and use them.

7. Divide your space

A small garden can seem larger if you can't see everything at once. Divide your garden using flower beds, screens or hedges to break up the space. Having different areas or sections in it will make your garden more interesting to look at.

8. Use light-colored landscaping

Using light-colored materials will help light bounce around, and the garden will appear more spacious than dark paving or paint colors. This will also brighten your garden if your outdoor space is on the shady side. Try light paving or gravel, or paint your borders in light colors.

9. Limit your planting beds

Limit your planting beds in a small garden. This will help your design look cohesive and less cluttered than using lots of individual plants. One way to make your garden look more professional is to plant a certain number of plants repeatedly.