How Do You Choose a Landscape Style?
Choosing a landscape style is one of the most personal decisions in the design process, because it determines how your home looks and feels from the street and how the outdoor space serves you. Understanding the main landscape styles and what makes each distinctive helps you identify what resonates, which gives a designer a clear direction. Here’s a guide to the main approaches.
Formal and Traditional
Formal landscapes are organized around symmetry, geometry, and clipped, controlled plants. Think of straight or mirrored beds, manicured hedges, topiaries, and a clear sense of order and structure. They complement traditional architecture and give properties a polished, maintained appearance. The trade-off is maintenance: formal landscapes require regular clipping and shearing to maintain their shape, and they’re not forgiving of neglect. If the crisp, orderly aesthetic appeals to you and you’re committed to the maintenance, formal design delivers a distinctive, classic look. (For more on this, see Landscape Design Styles and What They Cost.)
Naturalistic and Informal
Naturalistic designs use curved lines, layered plantings, and plants chosen to grow naturally without constant trimming. They feel more relaxed and often more ecological, since they can support wildlife and use plants adapted to local conditions. Naturalistic landscapes suit informal architecture and homeowners who prefer a look that evolves over time. They can be lower-maintenance than formal designs once established, since plants are chosen to fit their space rather than being forced into a rigid shape.
Cottage and Perennial Garden
Cottage style uses abundant, flowing plantings of flowering perennials, roses, ornamental grasses, and shrubs in a rich, exuberant mix. The effect is romantic, colorful, and full of life through the growing season. Cottage gardens require more attention than simpler landscapes, since the diverse plantings need deadheading, division, and management to stay at their best, but the seasonal payoff is substantial. This style suits homeowners who enjoy gardening as an activity, not just as a backdrop.
Modern and Contemporary
Modern landscapes use clean lines, bold masses of a few plant varieties, strong geometry, and often significant hardscape, with plants used as living architectural elements rather than natural drifts. Materials like concrete, steel, large-format stone, and gravel are common, and the overall aesthetic is spare, sculptural, and low-maintenance once established. This style suits modern or contemporary architecture and homeowners who want a sophisticated outdoor space without constant horticultural attention.
Native and Ecological
Native and ecological landscapes prioritize plants indigenous to the region, which are adapted to local soils, rainfall, and climate, and which support local wildlife including pollinators. Once established, native landscapes often require little irrigation and minimal care, since the plants belong in the environment. They’re particularly appropriate in regions with water restrictions or homeowners committed to supporting biodiversity. This approach may require more patience in the establishment years as plants mature, but the ecological and aesthetic payoff is substantial. EPA WaterSense recommends about one inch of water a week, avoiding midday watering, and weather-based controllers to cut waste.
Matching Style to Home and Life
The most successful landscapes match the style to the architecture and scale of the home, the homeowner’s maintenance commitment, the regional climate and conditions, and the uses the space must serve. A formal style on a casual ranch house feels jarring; a naturalistic planting on a formal Federal-style home may feel unresolved. Sharing inspiration images with a designer and being honest about how much upkeep you’ll enjoy helps them translate your taste into a design that will satisfy over years rather than just on installation day.
How Architecture and Style Should Work Together
One of the most reliable principles in landscape design is that the landscape should feel like a natural extension of the home’s architecture rather than something applied separately. A formal geometric landscape with clipped hedges and symmetrical beds feels appropriate around a traditional Colonial or Federal-style house, where the home’s own symmetry and formality are reinforced by the landscape’s character. The same formal treatment around a casual Craftsman bungalow or a contemporary house with strong horizontal lines can feel jarring, like wearing the wrong outfit. The architecture provides cues about the appropriate landscape vocabulary, and working with those cues produces a result that feels cohesive.
This doesn’t mean the landscape must literally match the architecture in every detail, but it should share some of its spirit. A contemporary home often suits a landscape with clean lines, bold masses of a few plant varieties, strong material relationships, and limited ornamentation, qualities that echo the building’s own restraint. A cottage-style home invites a more exuberant, layered planting that softens the architecture rather than competing with it. Regional vernacular matters too: landscapes that draw on native plants and local materials tend to feel grounded and appropriate in a way that imported styles sometimes don’t. Sharing images of your home and its neighborhood with a designer, not just inspiration landscapes in isolation, helps them propose a style that works with what’s already there rather than against it. (For more on this, see How to Choose the Best Plants for Your Landscape.)
Finding Your Style
Formal, naturalistic, cottage, modern, and native styles each offer a distinct approach to how the landscape looks and lives. Match the style to your home, your maintenance appetite, and your region, and share inspiration with your designer. When you’re ready to work with a local pro, connect below. (For more on this, see How to Find the Best Landscape Designer.)
Frequently Asked Questions
Formal and traditional (symmetry, geometry, clipped plants, high maintenance), naturalistic and informal (curved lines, layered plantings, relaxed look, often lower maintenance), cottage and perennial garden (abundant flowering plantings, romantic and exuberant), modern and contemporary (clean lines, bold plant masses, strong hardscape), and native and ecological (regionally indigenous plants supporting wildlife, often low-water once established).
A formal landscape organized around symmetry, geometry, and clipped, controlled plants: straight or mirrored beds, manicured hedges, topiaries, and a clear sense of order. It complements traditional architecture and gives properties a polished appearance. The trade-off is maintenance, since formal landscapes require regular clipping and shearing to maintain their shape and are not forgiving of neglect.
A landscape using curved lines, layered plantings, and plants chosen to grow naturally without constant trimming. They feel relaxed and often ecological, supporting wildlife and using plants adapted to local conditions. Naturalistic landscapes suit informal architecture and homeowners who prefer a look that evolves over time, and they can be lower-maintenance once established since plants are chosen to fit their space.
A landscape prioritizing plants indigenous to the region, adapted to local soils, rainfall, and climate, and supporting local wildlife including pollinators. Once established, native landscapes often require little irrigation and minimal care. They're appropriate in regions with water restrictions or for homeowners committed to supporting biodiversity, and they may require patience through establishment years as plants mature.
Match it to your home's architecture and scale, your realistic maintenance commitment, your regional climate and conditions, and how the space must be used. A formal style on a casual home feels jarring, and a naturalistic planting on a formal house may feel unresolved. Share inspiration images with a designer and be honest about how much upkeep you'll enjoy so they can design something that will satisfy over years.
