When it comes to designing an outdoor space, a blank piece of paper can be intimidating. Many people believe their first move should be to design a beautiful full garden plan. This tends to result in a stalled effort, a jumbled design, and an overall feeling of confusion. It’s much better to think of landscape design as a set of small, incremental design decisions. So rather than starting with the entire yard, start with just a section, a path, or a planting bed. This narrows down the view of the yard and allows the eye to focus. It also establishes an essential habit to develop as a beginner: the act of observation before design.
A great way to start practicing is to break apart three components which are often lumped together too early on: form, circulation, and planting. Find a basic outdoor space, even if it isn’t very pretty, and sketch out the basic forms you see in the space. Don’t worry about plant material, ornamentation, or color. Look for the edge of the lawn, paved areas, fencing, trees, and main paths. Notice where the eye is drawn, where the path seems constricted, and where the space opens up. This will sharpen your observational skills. Then go back and sketch the same space, but this time denote circulation. Only on your third pass should you introduce planting. This will help avoid cluttered designs which look intriguing on paper but in actuality don’t make much sense.
A very common beginner’s mistake is to design with plants prior to establishing the basic layout of the garden. While it’s tempting to start playing with foliage, bloom, and color because these are “fun” and “inspirational,” without a basic layout, these elements will only lead to confusion. This may look full on a design sheet, but it doesn’t direct the viewer’s eye, facilitate circulation, or integrate well with the house and yard. The fix is simple: suspend planting decisions and go back to the layout of the space. Concentrate on lines, points, spaces, and transitions. Once the layout starts to feel organized and cohesive, it will be easier to make planting decisions because they will enhance an already good design rather than compensate for a poor one.
Even if you only have fifteen minutes a day, that’s plenty of time to practice. Use the first five minutes to observe a space in the yard and jot down three observations: what works well, what doesn’t, and where does the eye go? Use the next five minutes to do a quick line drawing of the space, using simple shapes and ignoring planting. And in the last five minutes, make a change on that drawing. Perhaps make the path wider, simplify a planting border, or move a focal point to a better location. This is a far better use of your time than waiting until you have a couple of free hours. The more you practice, the better your design sense will become, and the more you will develop a quick eye for problems.
If you find you are getting frustrated in your efforts, it may be that your eye is trying to solve too many problems at once. If that’s the case, narrow your scope. If the layout is starting to feel confusing, quit worrying about the plants and just study the paths. If the planting is starting to feel dull, hold the layout steady and play with 3D form, mass, and bloom period. And if nothing seems to be working, work with two alternate sketches rather than pushing one design until it implodes. Place the two side by side and see which one feels more comfortable to navigate, easier to read, and easier to maintain. In the same way, feedback from others will be more effective if you ask a very specific question. “Do you like it?” is too broad, but “Do you find the path to the front door inviting?” will give you much more useful information.
In the beginning, progress in landscape design is almost never a result of Big Ideas. Rather, it comes from small, repeated observations, quick sketches, and a willingness to edit without attachment. It’s okay if the garden on paper isn’t grand and gorgeous at this point. It just needs to get a little better with each edit. If you approach the process through observation, layout, and tweaking, this will start to feel less like a crapshoot and more like iterative design.