How to Draw Landscape Design Plans: Simple Landscape Design Drawing Ideas

If you’ve ever wondered to yourself–how to design my backyard landscape like the professionals–you’ll find that you need to create detailed landscaping drawing ideas to help bring your vision to life. This may seem like a daunting task; but luckily, we can provide you with some guidance when it comes to drawing landscape design plans. 

So when you want to learn more about how to draw landscape design plans, you can continue reading below as we provide you with some landscape design drawing ideas and helpful tips to get started. 

What is Landscape Design Drawing?

At this point, you still may be unsure what landscape design drawing even is. Let’s do a quick overview of this practice so you know what to expect from the process and why it’s so important. 

Definition of Landscape Design Drawing

As you may be able to guess, this is the process of drawing out your design plans for your outdoor space. To be done correctly, the plans should be highly detailed and drawn to scale with your yard so the drawn-out plans translate easily into the real world. 

Your landscaping drawing ideas can include hardscapes like landscape water feature ideas, the plants you plan on incorporating into your yard, the configuration of different landscaping elements, and any other elements of landscape design. Essentially, everything you plan on including in your landscape design should be included in your drawings for the best results. 

The Importance of Landscape Design Drawing in Bringing Outdoor Spaces to Life

Drawing landscape design plans is an important part of ensuring your outdoor space comes to life with the vision you had in mind. If you approach your landscape design without proper planning first, you could face a number of serious issues. In other words, you can’t get away with guesswork when it comes to your landscape design, so your landscaping drawing ideas need to be thorough and detailed so you end up with the yard of your dreams.  

For instance, you could end up midway through your project and realize you were too ambitious, you won’t have enough materials to finish, your yard isn’t big enough for your vision, and a multitude of other problems that can be difficult to remedy. 

Once you break ground on your landscape design, you probably don’t have a lot of wiggle room to go back and re-do components if you realize you want to make some changes to the design. So, creating landscape design drawings helps you think through your design carefully and determine if it’s feasible for your yard, if it meets your expectations, and other important considerations. 

It’s much easier to scrap your design drawings and start from scratch when you want to make changes rather than hacking up your yard through trial and error. 

Can You Draw Your Own Landscape Design?

You may be worried that if you don’t have a ton of creative skills, you won’t be able to create landscaping drawing ideas properly. We will now cover some of the necessary skills you’ll need for drawing landscape design plans.  

Necessary Skills for Landscape Design Drawing

For proficient landscape drawing, you’ll need to have a good understanding of landscape design principles, in addition to technical and design skills. 

You’ll need to be good at drawing by hand or using computer-aided design (CAD) software if you plan on making your plans digitally. Aside from the technical side of things, you need to have an eye for design when it comes to proportionality, balance, color theory, focal points, and more to create a visually-appealing yard design. 

You should also be well-versed in the different plant species so you understand which plants grow well together, are native to your area, and have the same watering and shade needs. Another important landscape design component that is important when drawing your plans is regarding draining and grading. Understanding these principles will help you avoid potential issues like erosion, flooding, or pooling in your yard. 

Lastly, you should be aware of different regulations and rules in your area regarding hardscape construction like decks, patios, pathways, retaining walls, pools, fountains, and more. These are just some of the major considerations and skill sets you’ll need to have when creating your design drawings. 

The Challenges of DIY Landscape Design Drawing

As you can tell by now, there’s a lot that goes into landscape design drawing. To be done correctly, you’re not just putting pen to paper and throwing out some general ideas. A well-done landscape design incorporates very detailed plans that set up your project for success. This means you need to know how to avoid landscaping mistakes that date your home, which is a very common mistake that people make when they try this on their own. 

Thus, a major challenge of doing this on your own is having the proper knowledge about the principles of landscape design, and understanding what’s feasible given your yard size, existing landscape elements, your budget, your climate, and more. 

You may have a lot of ideas when it comes to how you want your yard to look. But, in practice, it may not be practical given your unique circumstances. A professional landscape designer understands the nuances that are involved in this process and can help you create a custom-designed landscape design that fits your preferences but also takes into account important regulations, climate considerations, draining principles, and more. 

Especially if you have specific design preferences in mind, like contemporary landscape design ideas or sustainable landscape design ideas, or if you want to figure out how to design a low-maintenance landscape, a professional can be the key to pulling this off successfully. 

The Cost of Professional Landscape Design Drawing Programs

If you’re doubtful about your own abilities in drawing landscape designs, you may want to consider hiring professionals to ensure it’s done properly. But, you may be concerned about the landscape design cost for drafting your plans. 

There are many factors that can affect the price of getting your landscape design plans drawn by a professional. They may charge an hourly fee for their work, per acre, or an upfront cost for the whole design. In general, you can expect to pay anywhere from $1,000 for a simple mock-up to $15,000 for more complex designs. 

Given this wide range, it’s important to shop around and get some quotes from different landscapers so you can find one that suits your budget, project specifics, and preferences. 

How to Draw Landscape Design Plans: Simple Landscape Design Drawing Ideas

If you want some help with how to draw landscape design, you’ve come to the right place. Let’s now walk you through how you can create your own landscape design plans. 

Basic Elements in Landscape Design Drawing

The first step in learning how to design front yard landscape is understanding the basic elements. These can vary depending on who you ask, but some of the major principles of landscape design include balance, lines, colors, contrast, texture, and flow or unity. 

Understanding how these elements interact and how to achieve them in landscaping is an important place to start your design process. Thus, each of these elements needs to be considered in order to design a landscape that looks visually appealing and like it was professionally done. 

Understanding Your Space: Site Analysis

Once you have the base knowledge necessary to properly design your yard, you need to make  a good analysis of your property and gauge the space you have to work with. 

Get a reliable map of your property, like the deed map to get started. You will need to make a good assessment of your space, including its soil makeup, topography and drainage, sun exposure, existing plants and hardscapes, and more. This will help you understand what changes you need to make to achieve your vision and the right scale and dimensions for your drawings. 

Sketching Your Initial Ideas: Basic Design Concepts

Now it’s time to get to work. Start drawing out the basic design concepts you have in mind for your landscaping. This can include the large elements you want to include like a grass area, a patio landscape design idea, pathways, flower beds, and other main components. 

Draw these out to scale with how much space they will take up in your actual yard. Make sure this is precise so you don’t overcrowd your space or leave it looking too sparse once you actually get to installing your landscaping. 

Detailing Your Plan: Placement of Plants, Structures, and Other Elements

With the major components taken into account, you can now add in some of the smaller details that really pull the yard together. 

This includes the actual placements of plants and flowers in your flower beds, a detailed design of the stones or pavers you’ll use for your walkway, accessories, planters, and chairs or tables you plan on adding to the patio, and more. Plus, you’ll want to make sure you have the right balance of landscaping vs hardscaping in your designs. 

Remember that both this step and the previous can be trial and error. The whole point of drawing out your plans first is that you have the ability to make quick changes to the design before you actually get started in your yard. So, take your time, be as detailed as possible, and keep refining your drawing until it meets your liking. 

Useful Tools for Landscape Design Drawing

If you really want to make sure your landscape drawings are high quality and useful, you could benefit from using tools like drafting paper, a compass, a straight edge or ruler, and quality pencils. Again, if you want to make your drawings digitally, you will need access to CAD software in order to do so. 

Why is Landscape Design Drawing Best Left to Professionals?

After reading through all the steps that go into drawing out your landscape design, you can probably see why it’s so worthwhile to hire professionals. Here are some of the main reasons why you may want to skip out on DIYing this process. 

The Complexity of Landscape Design Drawing

For starters, there is a lot of complexity that goes into learning how to draw landscape design. If you’ve ever tried this out for yourself, you probably realized quickly that it would be much more difficult than you originally anticipated. 

Being technically skilled in hand drawing or CAD drawing is already a big hurdle you’ll have to cross. Plus, not everyone has an eye for design and knows how to arrange their yard in a way that is attractive and professional-looking. 

When it comes to the specific landscaping principles that you need to be aware of, overlooking major elements like the different types of drainage solutions, plant placement, and other factors can lead to trouble, and cause you to re-do your landscaping altogether. 

Experience and Expertise: How Professionals Bring Value

You’ve likely never drawn up landscape design plans before, and if you have, it was probably only once or twice. 

The professionals do so on a regular basis, having a deep knowledge of the principles that go into landscape design, and staying up-to-date with industry trends and techniques that you may be unaware of. 

While you may be leaning towards DIYing your landscape design for cost-saving reasons, keep in mind that even small errors in your design can lead to serious flooding problems in your yard, structural issues with your home’s foundation, and other grave concerns that can lead to much higher repair costs down the road. 

So, it’s worth it to invest in professionals from the start so you have the peace of mind that things are done properly and to your standards. 

Efficiency and Detailing: The Advantage of Professional Tools

Similarly, the experts have access to beneficial tools, materials, and equipment that allow them to create quality landscape designs. The efficiency of these tools allows them to create detailed renderings of your yard, much more detailed than you’d be able to do on your own. 

Rather than investing in expensive tools for just one project, hiring professionals allows you to take advantage of these incredible resources. They can ensure your design renderings are precise and properly scaled to the size of your backyard. Using these tools can eliminate much of the human error that can come from creating them all by hand, and is a great bonus to working with professionals. 

The Balance of Art and Science: Understanding Plant Biology and Architecture

Above all, professional landscape designers understand the nuances of the craft and how to balance plant biology, ecology, sustainability, and architecture into your design. They will make sure your yard is a well-designed ecosystem that can flourish given the unique circumstances and characteristics of your property. 

Using their professional expertise and knowledge, they can help you discover plant combinations and hardscape features that you didn’t even know existed, or would be possible in your yard. Rather than DIYing the design yourself, the right professionals will go above and beyond your expectations, helping you craft a serene haven right in your own backyard. 

Rather Than Attempting to Draw Landscape Design on Your Own, Leave it to the Pros!

There’s no reason to try your own hand drawing landscape designs when you know of qualified and trusted professionals who do amazing landscape design in Alpharetta Ga. At Michaelangelo’s, we have years of experience and a passion for landscape design that help us bring your outdoor space visions to life. 

No more frustrations that your yard didn’t come out like you wanted it to, or creating an expensive mess in your backyard because you didn’t know how difficult it would actually be to pull off your design ideas. Expertly mastering both form and function, we can create an outdoor space that is just as practical as it is nice to look at. 

We go beyond just landscape design–we are also experienced in designing drainage solutions for your yard so you can keep erosion and flooding at bay. 

No matter what type of property you have, we can help. We are a proud commercial landscape maintenance company that can help you take care of the outdoor area of your office space. But, we are also a trusted residential landscape maintenance company so you can sit back and enjoy your perfectly-manicured landscape without even lifting a finger. 

Final Thoughts on How to Draw Landscape Design Plans 

Drawing your own landscape design is a big task with minimal room for error. If you’re investing a good amount of time and money into your outdoor landscape, you want to know that it is being done right, and you have the right plans from the start. So while you can try your hand at drawing the designs yourself, you’ll be much more successful when you hire professionals. 

If you’re looking for the top Alpharetta landscaping company, Michaelangelo’s Landscape is the right choice. Whether you’re looking for drought-tolerant landscape design ideas or minimalist landscape design ideas, we can take all your preferences and criteria into account and leave you with a stunning outdoor design that you only dreamt was possible. 

Visit Michaelangelo’s today to leave your project in the hands of professionals and watch your landscaping dreams come to life.