Author: Andra DelMonico

To have a beautiful design for your backyard, you need to use a combination of soft and hardscaping. Soft landscaping is the soft materials, such as grass, mulch, shrubs, trees, and soil.

The hardscaping is the concrete, stones, pavers, and gravel. When you combine them, you create varying textures and variety that adds visual interest.

These hardscaping ideas will get you inspired to upgrade your backyard. Perhaps you’d love to add a fire pit to your backyard. Or maybe you’ve always wanted a water feature.

Turn your small yard into a useable space and increase the value of your home with luxury materials.

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1. Incorporate Natural Stones

Using large boulders and rocks as a part of your landscape design can give your property a natural and rustic feel. This is perfect if you want to create a natural feel to your outdoor space. Look for large natural stones that you can have brought in and professionally arranged.

You can look at landscape ideas to get inspired. Use the large stones to build a privacy wall. Pile earth behind them to build a retaining wall. Stack them around a pool and build a fountain into them.

2. Create Inviting Outdoor Fire Pits

Adding an outdoor fire pit to your concrete patio can give you an additional outdoor entertaining space. This hardscape design is perfect for adding an outdoor entertaining space to your backyard.

Build your firepit out of paver or natural stone. Then have a flat stone pad around it that’s large enough to place chairs on. Make it larger so that people can move their chairs closer or further away to adjust how warm they get.

Consider building a stone bench around the fire pit. It can have a curved shape that matches the curve of the fire pit. Building the bench out of stone makes it look like it’s a part of the landscape.

Read more: 49 Fire Pit Ideas

3. Enhance Curb Appeal with Stylish Driveways and Paths

Don’t forget about landscaping your front yard. You can use hardscape ideas to add curb appeal to your home. Start with the driveway.

A basic option is to have a concrete driveway. This isn’t very stylish, but you can make it look nice by pressure washing it and keeping it looking fresh and clean.

For a modern and elegant look, replace the concrete driveway with natural stone tiles or pavers. This can improve the look of your driveway while also improving drainage and having a long usable lifespan. Be sure to pick a stone with a tumbled or hammered finish so that it isn’t slippery when wet.

Read more: 79 Landscaping Ideas for the Front of the House 

4. Elevate Garden Spaces with Decorative Elements

Having a garden is about more than growing plants. You should create an atmosphere by developing a landscape design theme. You can incorporate this into your garden for a cohesive look throughout the entire yard.

Start your hardscape project by building solid concrete or stone planter boxes for your garden. Then build off of these with stone or gravel walkways around them.

If you prefer a more freeform style of garden, you can add hardscape elements to it. Place a bench among the flowers. Add a few statues to fill in empty areas.

5. Maximize Small Yards with Clever Hardscaping

Using hardscaping in your small backyard can help you make the most of your space. Build out your backyard patio with concrete pavers. This lets you smoothly transition from the seating area to the lawn. Now you can have a diverse outdoor living area, no matter how small it may be.

Build raised garden or flower beds along one or two of the walls. This adds varying heights to the space and makes it feel bigger. You’re also adding built-in decor. Install a pole or column and string lights from it overhead. This illuminates the entire space and helps it to feel bigger.

6. Build Opulent Outdoor Spaces with Premium Materials

Turn your hardscape into a luxurious outdoor lying space. Build large patios that you can turn into an outdoor kitchen, swimming pool platform, or outdoor living room.

Cover these areas with a pergola and create some shade. This makes them more enjoyable to use during the hottest months when the sun is shining bright.

Use more expensive materials that you would traditionally find in higher-end homes. Pavers are a popular choice. You could also use slate tile. If you want to create a traditional look, use red bricks.

7. Modernize Your Yard with Contemporary Hardscaping

Give your outdoor living space a modern feel by incorporating landscape lighting. Add lights in the ground that will point upward to brighten up the landscape. Have the lights line the walkway to help people navigate your yard.

To make this hardscape feature work, you should use a variety of hardscape materials. White or dark grey gravel works well as a ground cover around square concrete pavers and blocks of lush green grass. Line the different elements with a solid black piece of metal instead of pavers.

8. Transform Patios and Walkways with Elegant Pavers

Use brick pavers to cover your plain concrete patio. This dresses up the patio and makes it look more luxurious. You can also cover the patio in flagstone for a natural feel of rustic stones arranged together to create a smooth surface.

If you need to create a walkway in your yard, consider using concrete pavers. These are large square or rectangle-shaped pavers that you sink into the ground. Leave some space between them for a modern look.

Properties that have drainage problems need permeable pavers. These leave gaps between each of the pavers to allow water to flow through. This prevents standing water from pooling on the pavers.

9. Functional Elegance with Retaining and Garden Walls

Property that isn’t perfectly flat presents a unique challenge. You can accept the property as-is and its limited use. Or you can build a stone wall to function as a retaining wall. This levels the ground and allows you to create a step-down design.

When building your retaining walls, you can use metal, wood, stone, or concrete. The height and thickness of your retaining wall will depend on how much earth it needs to hold.

If you aren’t experienced, it’s smart to seek out the assistance of a professional experienced in building these walls. Otherwise, you risk the wall collapsing under the weight of the earth it’s holding.

10. Creative Solutions for Sloped Yards

Instead of building retaining walls, you can embrace the slope in your yard. Create a backyard hardscape design that slopes down the property. You’ll need to build water channels into the hardscape to allow for property drainage.

Build it into your lawn to encourage rich growth of the lawn and prevent depriving your lawn of moisture. Steps can also look good because they will follow the slope of the ground.

Large natural stones are perfect for this because they can be set into the earth. You could also use concrete to form the steps.

11. Design Distinctive Walkways for Practical Elegance

A stone walkway gives you a designated place to walk through your yard. This prevents your yard from getting trampled on or killed. It also helps you define the space by having paths that lead to each area of your yard.

Start the walkway at your back door or leading off of your patio or deck. Then have it end at your raised planter garden, fire pit, pond, or pool. You can also have it wrap around your house to the front of your yard. Lay a walkway down in your front yard to increase your home’s curb appeal.

12. Introduce Serene Water Features for Relaxation

Adding a water hardscaping feature to your backyard adds a natural soundtrack to your yard. You can do this with a fountain or small pond. Add natural stones around the edge and under the running water. This tumbles the water and creates more sound.

Scale the water feature to the size of yard you have. A small patio with limited space will look good with a pedestal fountain. A large sprawling property can support something larger, such as a koi pond.

For a modern look and increased privacy, add a water wall to your patio or deck. The cascading water will block your neighbor’s sight while also creating a relaxing atmosphere.

“All gardening is landscape painting.” –  William Kent

Landscaping transforms your property into a stunning creation that welcomes people in. It’s the difference between a dull property you don’t notice and one that’s abundant with curb appeal.

Adding some landscaping to your property can increase its value by up to 13%, so it makes for a great home improvement project.

So what does your landscaping look like? Perhaps the front of your home could use some flower beds. Or your backyard could benefit from some raised garden beds.

Try these simple landscaping ideas on your property and give it a long-overdue facelift. Start on one side of your home and work your way around until you’ve created a cohesive landscaping look around your entire home.

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1. Maximize Backyard Potential with Smart Landscaping

It doesn’t matter if you have a large or small backyard, the right landscaping can make or break the space. Create a landscape design that embraces what you already have, such as building off your patio or hardscape.

You could turn your small yard into an oasis with flowering bushes along the walkway and large plants around the perimeter. For larger backyards that have a large patio or deck, you can place planters.

You could have a small one that’s full of fresh herbs. Or you could have a larger one that runs along one of your fences. Use it to grow fresh vegetables and greens. 

2. Enhance Curb Appeal

Your home’s curb appeal can make or break how others see and value your home. Plant perennials and native plants around your home’s exterior. These plants will look beautiful throughout the year and year after year. This makes them lower maintenance.

Add flower beds along the front of your home. This helps to frame your house and add color. If you live in an arid climate, you can use grasses instead. These are hardy and will thrive with less water. Frame these beds with a decorative stone edging.

3. Create Privacy and Beauty with DIY Landscaping Structures

While you could hire professionals to come in and redo your landscaping for you, this isn’t necessary. With a bit of labor and know-how, you could build a pergola to cover your patio, a fence around your property for privacy, and a trellis for growing plants that vine.

Before you get started, come up with a landscaping design. Plan out your projects and work your way through them one by one. This will take some time but also helps prevent you from becoming overwhelmed or over budget. It helps to create a scale drawing of your backyard and then sketch in your ideas. 

4. Enhane Front Yard Charm with Floral Accents

Boost the curb appeal of your home with plenty of flowering plants. Larger front yards could have an island flower bed in the middle of the yard. Smaller yards can benefit from a small flower bed that lines the front of the house. 

If you have a front porch, place flower pots on it. You could hang flower boxes on the railing. You could also have hanging planters. This creates a more welcoming presence for those that visit you. With these plants, you can use annuals. Then change them out with the seasons.

5. Expanding Your Garden: Diverse Produce and Raised Beds

If you love gardening, then consider expanding your small garden into one that’s much larger. You could have a vegetable garden in one area, another for growing greens, and another for fruits. This would give you a variety of fresh produce throughout the year.

Use raised garden beds to make caring for your plants easier. You won’t have to dig around on the ground, and you can better control the soil composition. Build your beds out of stone, wood, metal, or anything else that will create the right look for the garden style you’re aiming for.

6. Select the Ideal Grass for a Lush Lawn

Having a lush green lawn is the hallmark of beautiful landscaping for many people. The trick is choosing the right grass for your climate and region. While grass may sound expensive, it’s actually one of the most affordable cheap landscaping ideas.

Think about the amount of light and water your yard gets. Then consider the yearly temperatures. You want to choose a grass that can thrive in these conditions. Otherwise, you’ll be fighting nature to keep it alive. Nothing is worse than dead grass that’s crispy and brown. Care for your lawn with regular mowing, weed killing, and fertilizing.

7. Effortless Landscaping with Low Maintenance Designs

If you don’t enjoy gardening or are too busy to regularly maintain your landscaping, then you need to strategically choose low maintenance designs. Instead of choosing plants that need regular trimming and pruning, choose a dense ground cover.

If you have a large deck or patio, place potted plants around the perimeter. Choose ones that flower or are small shrubs. They’ll only grow as big as the pot you put them in.

If you don’t want to deal with any plants, you can skip them altogether. Build a rock garden instead. Place large boulders around the yard and then surround them with pea gravel or sand. Use large stepping stones to create a walkway.

See more low maintenance landscaping ideas for your home here.

8. Maximizing Plant Health with Mulch Choices

Mulch is a must-have for insulating and protecting your plant beds. This applies to both raised beds and garden beds. Once you’ve created your beds, adding plants, and finished the edging, it’s time to add mulch. It will help retain moisture and insulate the plant’s roots from cold and heat.

Several varieties are available. There are large chunks, bark, or finely shredded types. Then you can choose a color; they range from natural light wood to dark brown and even red. Be sure to buy enough to create the right depth. Then check it seasonally to ensure you don’t need to add more.

9. Create Defined Outdoor Pathways

Adding pathways to your backyard gives you and your guests a designated place for walking. This prevents people from trampling over your lawn or gardens.

Mark out your pathways from the exterior door of your home, patio, or deck. Then have the path loop around your backyard or even around to the front of your home.

Finish your walkway with outdoor lighting to make it safer to walk at night. You could use stepping stones or pea gravel to pave the walkway. This will give it a more polished look than simply digging out the grass and creating a dirt path.

See more garden path ideas here.

10. Sloped Landscaping with Retaining Walls

If your property slopes, you have two options. You could embrace the slope and allow it to roll downward. However, this isn’t very useful. Instead, consider building a series of retaining walls. These will gradually step your property down and create several flat usable areas.

You’ll find that this is one of the more popular backyard ideas because it makes previously unusable space functional. Create several outdoor spaces, such as one level for a fire pit, another for dining, and another for a garden.