Best Landscaping Styles For Modern Houses

Modern homes are increasingly being adopted by the younger generation.

While traditional homes have their appeal, modern homes are favored by the younger generation for their cool, sleek aesthetics.

As you can imagine, traditional landscaping wouldn’t go too well with contemporary homes. With their sleek and often minimalist look, wild, lively flowers and flowing designs just don’t match their aesthetics.

As such, to ensure your landscaping enhances the overall aesthetics of your modern home rather than diminishing it, you need to choose the right landscaping style.

The good news is, that’s exactly what you’ll be learning in this article, so read on!

1. Minimalist Landscapes

Unsurprisingly, minimalist landscapes go very well with modern houses.

With their clean lines and shapes and restricted color palettes, minimalist landscapes bring an ultra-sleek vibe to your home.

Oftentimes, less is more. The less complicated something is, the more timeless and elegant it is when done right.

Minimalist landscapes, with minimal elements, also tend to be easier to maintain than traditional gardens, making them very suitable for modern lifestyles where people value convenience as well as low effort and time commitment.

To achieve the minimalist look, first off, you need to of course use minimalist colors and keep your color range limited. The best colors are usually neutral colors like white, black, and gray.

You also don’t want to be using too many different colors or even shades that are too different from each other. Your entire landscape should consist of no more than 2-3 different colors. This will keep your overall design cohesive.

Next, the lines and shapes of your paths, walkways, hardscapes, and even your plants need to be kept clean and neat.

This means you need to trim your plants regularly and ensure that they remain neat. Your plants should also be mostly green to keep in line with the minimalist aesthetic.

For your hardscapes, the same things apply. Choose elements with clean, neat shapes and lines. You shouldn’t be using elements that have less defined patterns or shapes that are more loose and wild.

For minimalist landscapes, it’s also usually better to have more hardscapes and fewer plants. Black and white hardscape elements just look more sleek than green plants, but green plants are still necessary to add some life to your outdoor space.

So having more hardscapes with some greenery will give you a balanced, sleek aesthetic.

Finally, make sure to keep your outdoor area as free of clutter as possible. In a minimalist landscape where everything is kept simple, even a little bit of clutter will stand out like a sore thumb and be very noticeable.

This means you need to also be conscious of clearing up fallen branches and leaves and each time after you finish using your outdoor living spaces, arrange the furniture back neatly.

With minimalist landscapes, you already have fewer plants to take care of, and hardscapes usually require very little maintenance, so make sure not to slack off on keeping your space neat and uncluttered.

2. Japanese Zen Gardens

Next, Japanese Zen gardens are another landscape style that’s very well-suited for modern spaces.

Japanese Zen gardens emphasize simplicity and elements of minimalism to create a space for contemplation and relaxation. This simplicity and minimalism create a timeless, elegant aesthetic.

They’re not as sleek as minimalist landscapes, but their timeless elegance pairs perfectly with the sophisticated vibes of modern homes.

A lot of Zen garden concepts are similar to minimalist landscapes.

The entire space should be kept uncluttered to minimize distractions and allow visitors to focus on their thoughts and to facilitate contemplation.

The plants used are also mainly greens.

And on top of that, many Japanese Zen gardens predominantly consist of hardscapes.

Of course, there are some differences.

For Japanese Zen gardens, in contrast with minimalist landscapes, you actually want looser patterns and shapes that have a flow to spur contemplation, rather than clean neat shapes that won’t facilitate thought as well.

Color-wise, Japanese Zen gardens also focus more on natural colors and materials like stone, rather than neutral colors like white and black.

All in all, Japanese Zen gardens share many concepts with minimalist landscapes, with a few key differences that give Zen gardens their unique aesthetic.

Either way though, both landscaping styles’ simplicity and minimalist concept make them perfect fits for modern homes.

3. Xeriscaping

Lastly, xeriscaping, aka drought-tolerant landscaping, is a landscaping style for minimizing water and maintenance needs.

Xeriscaping is the ultimate low-maintenance landscaping style, requiring the least water and least maintenance. This makes them great for modern homeowners who value convenience and an easy, low-maintenance outdoor space.

Xeriscaping, with its low water requirements, is also more environmentally friendly.

To create a xeriscape, there are three main elements–native plants, efficient irrigation systems, and water-efficient elements.

Native plants are plants that can grow naturally in your local region, which means they’ve adapted to the local conditions and can survive entirely on rainwater alone.

In other words, regardless of their water requirements, when you use native plants, most of the time, they won’t require any watering except during long periods without rain or when they’re in more vulnerable stages like germination.

So most of the time, you won’t even have to water them at all.

They will also have developed resistance to local pests and diseases, reducing the need for pesticides and additional care.

As such, native plants are the easiest to take care of and require the least supplemental watering.

Then, to further reduce the amount of maintenance you need to do and to ensure that when watering is required, it’s done efficiently, efficient irrigation systems like drip irrigation systems should be installed.

Finally, to ensure the rest of the outdoor space is also water-efficient, you’d use water-efficient elements like hardscapes that require very little maintenance and artificial turf so that no watering is required, just the occasional cleaning.

In terms of aesthetics, xeriscapes aren’t particularly sleek or elegant, but they are simple. While they won’t enhance your contemporary aesthetics, they won’t diminish it either.

Overall, you’d have a super low-maintenance landscape that conserves water extremely well, not only saving you time and money, but also contributing to environmental friendliness and being more sustainable.

Conclusion

So when it comes to modern landscaping, you have a few landscaping styles to choose from. You can either choose a super sleek look, a more elegant look, or go for a more low-maintenance landscape.

Either way, it’s always a good idea to hire professionals who know what they’re doing to guarantee you a beautiful, well-done outdoor space.

For example, Louisville Landscape Pros is an excellent landscaping company that specializes in landscaping Louisville homes, so Louisville residents should opt for companies like that.

Similarly, wherever you stay, make sure to do your research and choose a reputable local landscaper like Louisville Landscape Pros.