10 Ways to Design Your Garden for a Deeper Connection With Nature
Discover how to connect with nature in your garden, such as introducing fragrant plants and welcoming wildlife
Lauren Dunec Hoang
9 April 2021
Houzz Editor; landscape designer and former garden editor for Sunset Magazine and in-house designer for Sunset's Editorial Test Garden. Her garden designs have been featured in the Sunset Western Garden Book of Landscaping, Sunset Western Garden Book of Easy-Care Plantings (cover), Inhabitat, and POPSUGAR.
Houzz Editor; landscape designer and former garden editor for Sunset Magazine and... More
Gardens can connect us to the natural world in meaningful ways, whether we’re plucking the first ripe berries of the season or pausing to watch wild birds flit through foliage. While we most often talk about the nuts and bolts of landscape design – the shrubs, pathways and irrigation systems that make them work – let’s take a moment to explore the less tangible ways we can design our gardens to foster connection with nature.
1. Plant something from your childhood
Gardens can be powerful places for connecting us to our roots. Perhaps you remember smelling a specific type of flower your grandmother grew, biting into an heirloom tomato or climbing among the branches of a certain type of tree. Try putting one or more of these nostalgic plants in your own garden as a way to honour that memory or loved one.
Gardens can be powerful places for connecting us to our roots. Perhaps you remember smelling a specific type of flower your grandmother grew, biting into an heirloom tomato or climbing among the branches of a certain type of tree. Try putting one or more of these nostalgic plants in your own garden as a way to honour that memory or loved one.
David Austin Roses
2. Engage the senses
Scent is a powerful memory trigger. If there’s a fragrance you associate with a period in your life or a loved one, adding this scent to your garden can take you right back. If you don’t have something in particular you’d like to plant, you can’t go wrong with David Austin’s ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ rose, a pink beauty with a cabbage-like centre and an old-fashioned rose fragrance.
Adding plants for texture, such as fuzzy dusty miller (Jacobaea maritima, syn. Senecio cineraria), or for movement, like ornamental grasses that sway in the slightest breeze, is another way to engage the senses and make you feel more connected to a garden.
Does your garden need a little TLC? Find a local gardener to keep it looking lush
Scent is a powerful memory trigger. If there’s a fragrance you associate with a period in your life or a loved one, adding this scent to your garden can take you right back. If you don’t have something in particular you’d like to plant, you can’t go wrong with David Austin’s ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ rose, a pink beauty with a cabbage-like centre and an old-fashioned rose fragrance.
Adding plants for texture, such as fuzzy dusty miller (Jacobaea maritima, syn. Senecio cineraria), or for movement, like ornamental grasses that sway in the slightest breeze, is another way to engage the senses and make you feel more connected to a garden.
Does your garden need a little TLC? Find a local gardener to keep it looking lush
3. Slow your journey
Gardens are often places we go to wind down from the rush of everyday life. Think about ways you can set up a garden to help you slow down – perhaps by creating a meditative labyrinth or simply adding more bends and curves to garden paths.
Gardens are often places we go to wind down from the rush of everyday life. Think about ways you can set up a garden to help you slow down – perhaps by creating a meditative labyrinth or simply adding more bends and curves to garden paths.
Using stepping stones, rather than a smooth paving material, can be a useful way of slowing your journey through a garden.
Ground covers grown between flagstones (like the woolly thyme pictured here) can also engage the senses with a tangy herbal smell if crushed. The velvety lamb’s ears (Stachys byzantina) planted on either side of the path seen here tempt one to bend down and touch the leaves.
Ground covers grown between flagstones (like the woolly thyme pictured here) can also engage the senses with a tangy herbal smell if crushed. The velvety lamb’s ears (Stachys byzantina) planted on either side of the path seen here tempt one to bend down and touch the leaves.
4. Add a meaningful object
Find a home in your garden for an object that holds meaning for you, whether it’s a religious figure, a piece passed down from a friend or family member, or something special found on a trip. You can elevate an object’s presence by mounting it on a pedestal or placing it at the base of a mature tree, with the trunk as a backdrop.
Meaningful objects, such as small garden statues passed down from a loved one, can also be effective when tucked into garden beds. When your eye falls on them, you may remember that special person.
Find a home in your garden for an object that holds meaning for you, whether it’s a religious figure, a piece passed down from a friend or family member, or something special found on a trip. You can elevate an object’s presence by mounting it on a pedestal or placing it at the base of a mature tree, with the trunk as a backdrop.
Meaningful objects, such as small garden statues passed down from a loved one, can also be effective when tucked into garden beds. When your eye falls on them, you may remember that special person.
5. Welcome wildlife
Animals and insects give gardens life. The buzz of bees or the splash of a bird in a fountain can instantly grab your attention and make you feel more present in a garden.
Plant native species that act as host plants for pollinators or provide food for indigenous birds. Hang a bird house and put out a source of water, such as a birdbath or plant saucer filled with water. By setting up your garden to help support the creatures around you, you can – in a small way – be connected to a larger natural ecosystem.
Animals and insects give gardens life. The buzz of bees or the splash of a bird in a fountain can instantly grab your attention and make you feel more present in a garden.
Plant native species that act as host plants for pollinators or provide food for indigenous birds. Hang a bird house and put out a source of water, such as a birdbath or plant saucer filled with water. By setting up your garden to help support the creatures around you, you can – in a small way – be connected to a larger natural ecosystem.
6. Celebrate the history of the site
You may have inherited landscape features that you might not have otherwise chosen. Instead of seeing these elements as eyesores, imagine the story behind them. This shift in mindset may even make you feel more connected to the history of your home or garden and the people who came before you.
You may have inherited landscape features that you might not have otherwise chosen. Instead of seeing these elements as eyesores, imagine the story behind them. This shift in mindset may even make you feel more connected to the history of your home or garden and the people who came before you.
Take this USA farmhouse garden in Old Mill Creek, Illinois, for example. The owners inherited the ruins of an old dairy barn and a concrete grain silo as part of the site.
Instead of wiping the slate clean, they opted to preserve the history of the site and turn the ruins into a walled garden space with a bocce court. The space has more meaning than if the owners had simply constructed new walls to enclose it.
Instead of wiping the slate clean, they opted to preserve the history of the site and turn the ruins into a walled garden space with a bocce court. The space has more meaning than if the owners had simply constructed new walls to enclose it.
7. Add a secluded seating nook
Even if most of your garden is geared toward outdoor entertaining, you can tuck a bench or seats for a few people in a space away from the main gathering area. You may find that you gravitate toward these areas when you’d like to be quiet and just sit and gaze at the garden.
Look for half-hidden spots that feel more private, such as a side yard, a place tucked alongside a garden shed or a partially concealed spot behind plants.
Even if most of your garden is geared toward outdoor entertaining, you can tuck a bench or seats for a few people in a space away from the main gathering area. You may find that you gravitate toward these areas when you’d like to be quiet and just sit and gaze at the garden.
Look for half-hidden spots that feel more private, such as a side yard, a place tucked alongside a garden shed or a partially concealed spot behind plants.
8. Bring in water
Through engaging your senses and welcoming wild birds, water elements can help you feel more present in and connected to your garden. Plus, in urban gardens, fountains that have a consistent trickle or splash can also help distract from the sounds of traffic and make the place feel more like a soothing retreat.
You don’t need a fancy or expensive fountain to bring water to your outdoor space. A simple design using a galvanised tank, a drilled stone or paver for the water to spill over, and an inexpensive fountain pump can create a lively recirculating fountain, as pictured here.
Through engaging your senses and welcoming wild birds, water elements can help you feel more present in and connected to your garden. Plus, in urban gardens, fountains that have a consistent trickle or splash can also help distract from the sounds of traffic and make the place feel more like a soothing retreat.
You don’t need a fancy or expensive fountain to bring water to your outdoor space. A simple design using a galvanised tank, a drilled stone or paver for the water to spill over, and an inexpensive fountain pump can create a lively recirculating fountain, as pictured here.
9. Take note of subtle seasonal changes
Part of the magic of gardens is that they are constantly changing and evolving. Slowing down and noting small changes – roses beginning to bloom over a trellis in spring or grasses turning tawny in late summer, say – can help connect you to the seasons. Go a step further by including plants that you look forward to seeing, picking or smelling at each time of year.
Part of the magic of gardens is that they are constantly changing and evolving. Slowing down and noting small changes – roses beginning to bloom over a trellis in spring or grasses turning tawny in late summer, say – can help connect you to the seasons. Go a step further by including plants that you look forward to seeing, picking or smelling at each time of year.
10. Start a new tradition
Look for ways to connect future generations to a garden. Whether you plant a tree for the birth of your child or a niece, nephew or grandchild, or you have children place handprints in cast-concrete stepping stones and sign their name and the date, additions like these can make gardens feel more meaningful to the whole family.
Look for ways to connect future generations to a garden. Whether you plant a tree for the birth of your child or a niece, nephew or grandchild, or you have children place handprints in cast-concrete stepping stones and sign their name and the date, additions like these can make gardens feel more meaningful to the whole family.
Your turn
What do you do to feel more connected to your garden? Share your thoughts in the Comments. And remember to like this story, save the images for inspiration and join the conversation.
More
Want more beautiful garden inspiration? Read up on 12 Ways to Design a Low-Maintenance Garden
What do you do to feel more connected to your garden? Share your thoughts in the Comments. And remember to like this story, save the images for inspiration and join the conversation.
More
Want more beautiful garden inspiration? Read up on 12 Ways to Design a Low-Maintenance Garden
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This is a beautiful garden feature! Great ideas for connecting with nature and making magical memories.
What a wonderful article even for a flat dweller like myself but should I ever own a garden space, to recreate memories from childhood is such lovely idea... So lupins and forget-me-nots for me!! And for scent it would have to be lily-of-the-valley... my mother's favourite. She had a bouquet of them when she got married... Their fragrance is divine.
Also love the many stories of how plants have been able to 'live on' thorough the generations to preserve memories... Nice.