Three Landscaping Tips for Amateur Gardeners

Updated 05/04/2022

When you have a yard that you want to be well-landscaped, it’s important to first come up with some great landscaping ideas for your front yard. You can use garden designers and landscapers to help you, or you can come up with an elegant landscape and design on your own. It can be helpful to have a designer plan out your custom backyard landscaping to take advantage of their expertise.

Often, a designer can come up with ideas that you wouldn’t have thought about for your yard. They also know what works well in your area and which plants won’t take a lot of maintenance. The design and layout of lawns and gardens also take into account the aesthetics of the designs. They should be pleasingly arranged so that they really make the property pop.

When you add landscaping to a home, it can add value to the property. With more curb appeal, more people will be interested in the home and the beautifully kept grounds. If you don’t have any landscaping on your property yet, it’s a good idea to start making a plan. Use websites like Pinterest to find great pictures to inspire your landscaping and garden design.

Your yard should be a personal sanctuary, a great space for entertaining guests, relaxing your cares away, and simply living. However, if you’ve got more weeds than grass, untrimmed trees and shrubs, and lack even the semblance of landscape design, it can be a difficult place to enjoy. Fortunately, there are a number of steps even amateur gardeners can take to turn their property into a landscaping delight. Follow these landscaping tips for beginners to create the yard you’ve always wanted!

First Things First: Clean Up
While it might be tempting to start planting tree and shrubs, but your project will be easier and will start showing results faster if you start fixing your yard’s problems to create a blank slate. Your first step should be the grass itself: mow it and rake away any weeds and debris. Next, weed any existing garden beds. When you’re finished, your yard will already look cleaner and more relaxing.

Edge and Mulch Your Garden Beds
Edging and mulching your garden beds helps create a crisp, defined break between the grass and your gardening spaces, making your yard look cleaner and well-maintained. Simply take a flat-edged shovel and “cut” along the edge of the bed without expanding too far beyond the existing lines, as this can quickly turn into a big project. When you’re done, you can use plastic edging materials and other materials, but most gardeners recommend just spreading out mulch, which has a similar visual effect, suppresses weeds and helps retain moisture. Don’t lay down any more than 4 inches, and leave room around the base of each plant.

Work With What You Have
Figure out where you want to plant different flowers, shrubs and other plants and then begin analyzing the conditions. How much sun and shade does the area get? What is the soil like? Once you have idea of what you will be working with, decide on your gardening style: for example, do you like ordered, symmetrical gardens or the pleasant disorder of cottage-style landscaping? After you have decided on these details, you can head to your local garden centers to pick out plants that work for both your style and the conditions of your yard.

If you don’t have a lot of gardening experience and have a yard that needs help, landscaping can seem like an impossible project. However, with these landscaping tips for beginners, you can turn your yard into the peaceful, beautiful spot you desire. And if you run into difficulty, contact a local landscaping company: they’ll not only have more landscaping tips for beginners for you to take advantage of, but also landscaping services that can help make your gardening plans a reality.