How To Blend Landscaping With Outdoor Living Structures
A pavilion, pergola, or gazebo can add beauty, shade, and function to your backyard. But when the structure is simply placed in the yard without thoughtful landscaping, the space can feel unfinished. By adding hardscaping, plants, lighting, walkways, and comfortable seating, you can create an outdoor living area that feels natural, inviting, and connected to the rest of your home. Use this guide to explore landscaping ideas that can turn your new outdoor living structure into a lively, beautiful backyard space.
Start with the Purpose and Placement of Your Structure
Before thinking about what landscaping to build around your new pavilion, pergola, or gazebo, you need to decide what the main purpose of this space will be. Will it be a place for entertainment, an outdoor dining setup, or a quiet escape? If you are looking for an entertainment space, you’ll want to consider seating, a bar or grilling area, and a wide-open space with plenty of shade. For an outdoor dining setup, add a table and chairs, a rug, overhead fans to keep flies away, and lighting for late dinners. If the purpose is to simply provide a quiet space, add a couch with soft cushions, blankets, a small table, and plenty of plants to provide a calm atmosphere.
Before choosing plants, lighting, or hardscaping, think about where your structure will be placed in your backyard. If you’d like your pavilion or pergola to connect with your home or to cover your existing patio, then consider matching your outdoor structure to your home. This will create a smooth transition from your home to the shaded area. Think about roof style, color, and stonework to create a seamless flow. Regardless of how close your structure is to your home or how far away it is placed in your backyard, you can customize your perfect structure.
Landscaping Tips for Your Space
Hardscaping. A stone, gravel, brick, or paved surface underneath your pavilion, pergola, or gazebo instantly elevates your space. This area can also be customized to match an existing patio, walkway, or other outdoor feature, creating a cohesive, finished look.
Walkways. Not only does a walkway help avoid walking in the grass to get to your outdoor structure, but it also provides a beautiful entry that could tie in with an existing patio. If your patio is made of a particular hardscape, using this same material for your walkway can create a cohesive appearance.
Plants. Any kind of greenery or pop of color is going to add beauty to your outdoor structure, especially if those plants are included in the landscaping around your structure. You can take the simple route and add some potted plants under your structure, or you can incorporate these plants around your structure or along your walkway.
Trees. Not only are trees a beautiful addition to any backyard space, but placing your structure along a tree line or planting trees behind your structure can help make your space more private and secluded. Smaller trees can also help fill out flower beds or garden areas, creating a more complete and layered landscape.
Lighting. Adding ground lights along a walkway to your pavilion, pergola, or gazebo will not only make it a safer and easier way to get from your home to your structure but also add a calming ambience to your backyard when the sun goes down. String lights are often placed under these outdoor structures as well. A pergola makes string lights easy to hang due to the open-roof layout, but pavilions and gazebos can also have string lights placed under the roof.
Landscaping for Pergolas, Pavilions, and Gazebos
Almost any landscaping can elevate an outdoor structure, but each style benefits from different finishing touches. For pergolas, consider hanging plants from the open slat-style roof and adding climbing plants to the structural beams. These additions of greenery soften the open frame and take advantage of the partial shade and sun with the roof style. If you are landscaping a pavilion, it can benefit from a fully finished space like a dining set and a fire pit, because of the fully covered roof and higher roof pitch. For a gazebo, focus on plants, curved walkways, flowers, and adding a quiet seating area to create a calm area to relax.
Bring Your Outdoor Structure and Landscape Together
Often, it helps to picture the finished backyard by looking at real examples and what kind of landscaping can be done with these types of outdoor structures. Look at this wood gazebo (above) with gorgeous plants filling the mulch landscaping. Adding the brick patio, ground lights, string lights, and seating area inside and out offers a beautiful space to relax after a long day. This gazebo is screened in as well, making it a cozy spot to sit at night without being bothered by bugs.
This beautiful Alpine Pavilion (above) blends naturally with the pool and patio area. The roof complements the stone trim around the pool, while the cushioned chairs, grill, kitchen area, string lights, and curtains create a cohesive, comfortable space for relaxing or entertaining. Rocks, flowers, and trees around the pavilion help soften the space and make it feel connected to the rest of the backyard.
Ready to create a backyard space that feels complete? Contact us or call 610-593-7700 to talk through your outdoor living ideas. The Stoltzfus Structures team can help you choose the right structure and bring your backyard vision to life.
Jada Morris
Recently graduated from college, I take advantage of having more free time and spend those moments catching up on my love of reading, brainstorming ideas for design projects, and spending time with my family, friends, and furry companions. I have two Golden Retrievers that are complete opposites, one who has enough energy to run three marathons a day if he could, and the other who would be happy to stay in bed all day! I might relate a bit more to the later but am always up for an adventure.
