8 Top Landscape Design Trends For 2024, According To New Report

The days of golf course lawns may be coming to an end, according to two recent surveys. Homeowners are strongly interested in improving their outdoor spaces – with referral and review site Yelp reporting a 41% increase in home gardening this past year – but their priorities are shifting from manicured to more livable.

This is good news for homeowners’ well-being, their properties, and the environment. Garden Media Group’s 2025 Garden Trends Report – dubbed “Nature’s Renaissance” – goes into even greater detail. The report also noted, ““According to recent research from Virginia Tech, a well-landscaped home an enjoy up to a 12.7% increase in property value,” which can enhance your financial well-being as well!

How can these eight trends inspire and inform your outdoor projects? Outdoor living professionals across the country weighed in.

Yelp Trends

Yelp’s 2024 Summer Home and Outdoor Trends shared some interesting changes in site user searches from April 2023 to April 2024.

1. Sensory Gardens

“These gardens stimulate your senses, using fragrant and textured flora like lavender plants (up 77%) and rosemary plants (up 38%), both of which can also help deter mosquitoes,” the survey reported.

2. Calming Sounds

“Wind chimes and water features like water fountains (up 36%),” according to the survey.

“Sounds within the garden can help create an extra layer within the sensory garden,” Tully noted. “It can help mask nearby noise pollution or call one into the outdoor space with the soothing sounds you mostly find in spas or wellness retreats.”

3. Resilience

“Many people are demonstrating an interest in taking their self-sufficient backyard endeavors to the next level, with increases in searches for homestead gardens (up 25%), edible plants (up 254%), chicken coops (up 76%), and beekeeping (up 61%),” according to survey findings.

Tully sees the trend as not just a self-sufficiency feature for homeowners, but as a conversation piece as well. “When friends and family are sharing a meal that they planted, grew, and harvested, it becomes a much more personal experience. It brings a greater connection to the land and the people you share with,” he observed.

Garden Media Group Trends

This communications firm uses proprietary data to study consumer trends in the lawn and garden industry. These were among the top trends its survey found.

4. Social Retreat

Homeowners are connecting with social media to get ideas, inspiration and information – particularly from the companies providing products for outdoor spaces, according to the report. “Homeowners are increasingly looking to brands not just for products, but for a deeper connection, community, guidance, and expertise in optimizing their outdoor living spaces, GMG’s president Katie Dubow noted.

“Homeowners are engaging in much more product and builder research, carefully contemplating their decisions and being far more intentional about their design ideas and inspiration,” Southern New Jersey-based landscape designer Sean Collinsgru agreed. “They’re taking the time to do more of their own product research, seeking out multiple builder quotes, and focusing on getting things done right the first time,” he added. He also pointed out that companies are offering digital tools to help in the planning process, making conversations with pros like him more productive.

5. Lived-in Gardens

“This movement is a delightful shift from the pristine and untouched towards a more genuine, seasoned aesthetic,” the findings reported but, as DuBow pointed out, “84% of newly-built homes in 2022 were part of an HOA,” and face restrictions on what they can plant. “To adapt lived-in gardens to these rules, they may need to present their garden plans to their HOA board to seek exceptions or approvals for certain elements, especially if they can demonstrate that their design enhances the property's aesthetics and follows sustainable landscaping practices, which is advocated by many HOA’s today.”

Brooklyn-based landscape designer Brett Kessler is seeing this trend in her residential projects, she shared. “People want textures and layers, not just static evergreen and lawn.” She’s gotten numerous requests to remove lawns in favor with plantings and outdoor living areas. “They want these spaces to be vibrant and unique. The ‘lived-in’ is more literal – they actually want to inhabit their outdoor spaces, and they want to encourage pollinators and wildlife (but never deer) to live there, too,” she added. Homeowner associations tend to favor well-manicured front lawns, but regional water restrictions may shift that preference over time.

6. Living Fences

Homeowners are requesting screening plants, rather than traditional fences, because they seem "friendlier" with their neighbors to have softer screening, Kessler commented, likening them to the English clipped hedge garden style, adding that they also make residents feel more immersed in nature. “From a design perspective, I think living fences are great because they obscure the hard edge of a property line, giving the illusion that a space may extend farther than it does. Fences are so abrupt!”

While living fences provide benefits, there are downsides too, as DuBow noted: “The biggest is growth time. Unlike wooden or metal fences, living fences take time to establish. During their growth period, they may not provide immediate privacy or security.” There are also risks of pests that can affect other plants in the garden and inconsistent heights and growth rates.” These features are most popular in temperate climates like the Pacific Northwest and Southeast. Regions with extremes, like the desert Southwest and frigid Northeast are less hospitable to living fences, she added.

A hybrid could be a successful alternative. “Privacy screens and entertainment walls can serve more than one purpose, harboring planters, TVs, lighting, and more – all while obscuring wind, rain, and the eyes of a neighbor,” noted Michelle Hendricks, an executive with outdoor living products manufacturer Deckorators. “We often see homeowners choosing to incorporate unique textures and built-in plantings,” says Michelle Hendricks. The blend of structural and organic creates a durable, attractive and personalized property border.

7. Foraged

“In the past few years, I've had several clients express a desire for perennial fruiting plants in their landscapes, such as blueberry bushes, blackberry bushes, or strawberry plants,” Kessler remarked, suggesting that nostalgia for children roaming with baskets, idealized by influencers, may be at play here.

You don’t need an expansive property to add this feature, DuBow suggested. “Even small gardens or patios can used for foraging. Oasis Forage Products has great tips on how to find materials.”

8. Color of the Year

Teal was the color cited by the survey as the current top choice. “The choice of teal as reflects a broader trend towards colors that evoke tranquility and a connection to nature,” DuBow shared. “In today’s world, trends are so fleeting, so while teal is a gorgeous color, I think that the desires of customer change so frequently that as an accent piece, it won’t have staying power beyond 2025.”

Kessler agreed, but added, “I do see color as an enduring trend, however. People seem to be pulling back from the neutral white and green (with a touch of purple) plantings that have dominated in recent years and asking for more color in their gardens.”

“There has been a significant shift in home décor and lifestyle trends towards homeowners wanting to create a sense of sanctuary in their surroundings,” Hendricks commented. “This can be seen in the rising popularity of calming colors,” she added. “The beauty of taking inspiration from nature is that it’s timeless. Embracing new neutrals like terracotta against green accents and other neutrals is going to create a classic aesthetic that can always be modernized with new accessories.”