Outdoor Living
How to Create a Mediterranean Garden: Plants & Design
A Mediterranean garden trades lawn and lush borders for gravel, silvery herbs, sun-baked terracotta and the resinous scent of lavender and rosemary…
Outdoor Living
Your backyard can be the most-used room in your home. This section is about turning ordinary yards into places you actually want to spend time — patios and decks, fire features, lighting, shade, low-maintenance lawns and the planting that ties it all together. Expect practical ideas for every budget, whether you’re starting from a bare slab or refreshing a tired garden.Begin with our pillar guide to outdoor living and backyard landscaping, then browse the projects and gear that make the space inviting after dark and easy to maintain.Popular guides in this category:Backyard landscaping & outdoor living ideasThe best fire pitsThe best solar outdoor lightsSmall backyard ideas on a budget
Outdoor Living
How to Create a Cottage Garden: Plants, Layout & Style
A cottage garden is the most forgiving design style there is, because its whole charm comes from controlled abundance rather than precision.…
Outdoor Living
Companion Planting vs Monoculture: Which Wins?
How you arrange the plants in your garden is as consequential as what you plant. Two philosophies compete. Companion planting (a form…
Outdoor Living
Double Digging vs No-Dig: Which Is Better?
How you prepare the soil shapes everything that grows in it, and gardeners have spent generations arguing over two opposing philosophies. Double…
Outdoor Living
Sod vs Hydroseed: Which Is Better for a Lawn?
When you are starting a lawn from scratch — new construction, a regraded yard, or a tear-out and replant — you essentially…
Outdoor Living
How to Make Bokashi Compost: Fermentation, Bran & Burying
Bokashi is composting turned on its head. Where a traditional pile relies on oxygen and heat to slowly rot material, bokashi uses…
Outdoor Living
How to Make a Gravel Garden: No-Dig, Beth Chatto Style
A gravel garden is the answer to a hot, dry, low-maintenance bed that still looks alive. Pioneered in the famously rain-starved corner…
Outdoor Living
How to Build a Dry Stream Bed: Drainage, Rock & Grading
A dry stream bed, or dry creek bed, is one of the few landscaping features that is genuinely beautiful and genuinely useful…
Outdoor Living
How to Make a Compost Bin: Pallet, Wire & Bin Designs
A compost bin is the cheapest soil amendment factory you will ever own. It takes the kitchen scraps and yard waste you…
Outdoor Living
How to Build a Garden Arbor: Posts, Footings & Archway
An arbor is the garden structure that turns a path into an invitation. Set over a gate, an entrance to a vegetable…