Your Yard Is More Than a Collection of Plants
Living Outdoors — A Homeowner’s Guide to Understanding, Creating, and Enjoying Outdoor Spaces
When most homeowners think about landscaping, they think about plants. Trees, shrubs, flowers, and perhaps a nice lawn. They picture a new planting bed along the front of the house, some color around the mailbox, or a few trees for shade.
There’s certainly nothing wrong with that. Plants are an essential part of nearly every landscape. But landscaping is about much more than what we put in the ground.
Think about your home for a moment. Inside, you have rooms designed for different purposes. A kitchen for preparing meals, a living room for gathering with family, bedrooms for rest, and perhaps a quiet corner where you like to read.
Now think about the property surrounding your home. Why shouldn’t those outdoor spaces serve purposes just as meaningful?
That’s really what outdoor living is all about. It isn’t simply making your yard more attractive. It’s about creating places where life happens.
Looking Beyond the Plants
Your yard is an extension of your home. It can be a place to entertain friends, enjoy a meal, play with your children or grandchildren, unwind after a long day, or simply appreciate the world around you.
A shaded patio might become your favorite spot for morning coffee. A winding garden path might invite you to explore a corner of the property you rarely visit. A carefully placed tree can provide welcome relief on a hot summer afternoon, and a small fountain can add the soothing sound of moving water.
Perhaps it’s an outdoor kitchen where family and friends gather, a fire pit for cool evenings, a vegetable garden, or a quiet bench beneath an old tree.
And outdoor living isn’t limited to large properties or big budgets. A small courtyard, a modest backyard, or even a comfortable porch can become a wonderful place to spend time.
The possibilities are nearly endless. Plants are only one part of the picture, and what the rest of the picture looks like depends a lot on which side of the house you’re standing on.
The Front Yard and the Backyard: Two Different Personalities
I often tell homeowners that their front yard and backyard have two very different jobs.
Think of your front yard as the public face of your home. Particularly in traditional neighborhoods, it’s the first impression you make on visitors, neighbors, and anyone passing by. Ideally, it should complement the architecture of the house and fit comfortably within the character of the neighborhood. It doesn’t have to look like everyone else’s yard. It just needs to look like it belongs.
The backyard is a different story.
I like to think of it as your weekend sweatpants space.
It’s where you can relax, have fun, entertain friends, let the kids or dogs run around, cook on the grill, or simply enjoy a little peace and quiet without worrying so much about appearances.
Maybe you want a swimming pool, an outdoor kitchen, a vegetable garden, a workshop, or a hammock beneath a tree. Perhaps you’d rather have a natural garden full of birds and butterflies. Or maybe all you really want is a comfortable chair, a little shade, and somewhere to set down your coffee.
It’s your private outdoor living space, and it should reflect how you live.
Of course, the front yard can be enjoyed, too. A welcoming porch, a garden bench, or a shaded seating area can encourage conversation with neighbors and make the front of your home more inviting. And not every property fits the traditional front-and-back arrangement. Still, understanding the difference between public and private outdoor space is a useful place to start.
The front yard introduces your home to the world. The backyard is where you get to be yourself.
Start With How You Live
Which raises the obvious question: how do you actually want to use your outdoor spaces?
It’s one of the first things I ask homeowners, and the answers vary considerably. Some want a place to entertain large groups of friends. Others would prefer a quiet garden, a comfortable chair, and a little privacy. Families with young children may need open space for play, while someone approaching retirement may be more interested in comfortable outdoor living areas that take less maintenance.
And those needs change over time.
The play area that was so important when the children were young may eventually become a garden or an outdoor dining area. The big lawn that once seemed essential may become more work than its owners care to keep up with. Mowing has a way of losing its charm.
Our landscapes should be able to grow and change along with us. I encourage homeowners to look beyond what their property is today and imagine how they might enjoy it in the years ahead.
After all, our homes change with us. Why shouldn’t our landscapes?
Your Property Has Something to Say
How you want to live is only half of the conversation. The property itself gets a say, too.
Every property has its own character. Some come with beautiful mature trees, interesting views, natural slopes, or established gardens. Others are little more than a house surrounded by bare soil and a newly installed lawn.
Either way, there are opportunities.
Sunlight, shade, wind, drainage, soil conditions, and the surrounding environment all influence how a property can be used. A sunny patio might be wonderful on a cool spring afternoon and nearly unusable on a hot summer evening. A shaded corner that seems hopeless for a vegetable garden might be the perfect place for a comfortable seating area.
Sometimes the most interesting feature of a property is something that’s already there. An old tree, a natural depression, a distant view, or an unusual change in elevation can become an important part of the landscape.
Rather than trying to make every property look like something out of a magazine, I prefer to explore what makes that particular place interesting. Good landscape design doesn’t simply impose an idea onto a property. It works with what’s already there whenever practical.
And sometimes the best feature of a landscape is the one you didn’t have to build.
More Than Appearance
Of course, we all want our homes to look good. Curb appeal matters, and a thoughtfully designed landscape can add significantly to a property’s appearance and value.
But appearance is only part of the equation.
A beautiful patio that’s too small for the furniture isn’t particularly useful. An elaborate garden that needs more maintenance than the homeowner can give may quickly become a source of frustration. And a walkway that looks wonderful but doesn’t take people where they want to go will eventually be ignored. People will find their own way across the lawn, and the grass will show you exactly where they went.
Sometimes the most enjoyable outdoor spaces are surprisingly simple. A couple of comfortable chairs beneath a shade tree. A small table on the porch. A hammock tucked into a quiet corner of the yard.
Good outdoor spaces don’t necessarily require elaborate construction or expensive materials. They simply need to work for the people who use them.
A Little Planning Goes a Long Way
Getting there, though, usually takes a little forethought. And I’ll admit something.
Even after decades as a landscape architect, I’ve been guilty of visiting a garden center or one of those big-box home improvement stores and coming home with $500 or more worth of plants and other things that caught my eye. Then I unload everything, look at my purchases, and wonder, “Now what am I going to do with all this stuff?”
Come on, we’ve all done it!
There’s something about a garden center on a beautiful spring day that makes everything look like a good idea.
There’s nothing wrong with being inspired. In fact, inspiration is often where wonderful landscapes begin. But having at least a general plan for your outdoor spaces can help turn those individual purchases and ideas into something that works together.
You don’t have to build everything at once, and you certainly don’t need an elaborate design for every small improvement. Just give some thought to the bigger picture before you begin.
And yes, I still occasionally come home with a plant I hadn’t planned to buy. Old habits.
A Place to Live, Not Just Look At
Over the years, I’ve seen beautiful landscapes that were rarely used and fairly simple ones that became the center of family life. The difference wasn’t necessarily the amount of money spent or the number of plants installed.
It was how well those spaces served the people who lived there.
Our outdoor environments offer something the rooms inside our homes can’t. They connect us with the changing seasons, the sounds of nature, fresh air, sunlight, and the simple pleasure of being outside. They can be places for celebration and conversation, activity and recreation, or solitude and reflection.
And unlike the rooms inside our homes, landscapes are never really finished. Trees grow, gardens mature, families change, and the ways we use our outdoor spaces evolve with them.
That’s part of what makes them interesting.
So, the next time you look out your window or walk through your yard, try seeing it as something more than grass, shrubs, and a few trees. Imagine what you might do there. Who you might share it with. How you might enjoy it.
You may discover that what you’re looking for isn’t simply a better-looking yard.
It’s a better place to live.
Living Outdoors is a series exploring the many elements of residential landscape design, from plants and patios to drainage, lighting, outdoor recreation, and more. Stay tuned!
~ Eric
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