Rock Garden Design Ideas

Common rock garden plants grow naturally on high mountains, where they need to stand up to harsh conditions such as intense sun, high winds, and drought. To create a picture-perfect scene, experiment with wildflowers in an array of complementary hues; for a layered look and all-over color, combine mounded plants and groundcovers with various-size shrubs that provide vertical interest.

Even if you don't have a naturally rocky site, you can easily create one. In this front yard, a stone wall offers an ideal foundation and border for a variety of low-growing alpine classics, including Aubrieta 'Royal Blue', Phlox subulata, and Potentilla. Gypsophila franzii and Dianthus 'Tiny Rubies' fill crevices between stones and help to integrate the stone wall with the rest of the terrace garden.

For maximum visual interest in your rock garden, play with texture and vary the scale of plants and rocks. A mixture of conifers, shrubs, and perennials works beautifully to create a lush landscape that blends distinctive foliage and colorful blooms. Boulders, Mexican pebbles in a dry creek bed, and bricks in the winding pathway lend natural texture and additional drama.

Transform a sloping front yard into a street-side showstopper by bringing in locally sourced boulders and a variety of rock garden plants. In this corner lot, creeping cedar, pines, yucca, Japanese maples, ornamental grasses, and cannas create an eye-catching display. Best of all, the yard looks vibrant all year and never needs mowing.

When designing your rock garden, think of the space as a series of eye-catching vignettes that paint the overall landscape. Here, the orange blooms of Eriogonum umbellatum stand out against the gray-green foliage and pink blooms of Mojave sage (Salvia pachyphylla). Both plants are drought-tolerant and thrive with little maintenance.

Extend the gardening season by incorporating fun fall foliage and evergreens into your rock garden. In this Asian-style vignette, large boulders anchor plantings of Japanese and Siberian irises, which feature foliage highlighted with dramatic tips of gold. A native shore pine in the background shows off a sculptural form in keeping with Japanese garden design.

Enjoy a lush look in your garden with a bevy of flowering plants that scramble in and over a grouping of rocks. For a cohesive look, this rock garden features a warm color scheme of pink, red, and yellow blooms. The bed is tightly planted to achieve the carefree abundance typical of cottage gardens.

Add dramatic impact to your rock garden by pairing striking foliage with colorful blooms. In this composition, the feathery foliage of a low-growing juniper offers a lovely contrast to the cheerful pink flowers of candytuft and petunia. An evergreen groundcover like juniper offers multiple benefits: It fills in spaces between rocks quickly, it's drought-tolerant, and it adds year-round interest to the garden.

As you choose plants and design your garden, consider form as well as color. Pair perennial favorites with dwarf conifers that bring year-round texture and height to the scene. In this rocky site, the bright pink blooms of perennial sea thrift (Armeria maritima) softly enhance the sculptural forms of dwarf conifers and large boulders.

Drought-tolerant plants and rock gardening are natural partners. Many rock garden favorites can stand up to harsh conditions and don't require much care. It's easy to achieve a lush look without extra watering by paying close attention to plant choices. Plan to pair plants native to your region with eye-catching favorites like silvery lavender, artemisia, and dianthus.

This rock garden planted along the side of a driveway helps create an inviting entrance to the home. Heat-loving perennials suit the hot, dry climate and showcase intriguing foliage texture and color, while large boulders add rugged character. To create an informal look, drifts of sedum, salvia, yarrow, thyme, and oregano blend into one another and casually spill over onto the driveway.

Dwarf conifers are an ideal addition to any rock garden. For a cohesive look, vary foliage textures but stick to a unified color theme, such as silvery blue. Create a whole garden with conifers, tucking them between rocks, or pair the focal-point evergreens with colorful blooms for contrast. If you're mixing plants, be sure to plant the conifers beside or behind other low-growers to maintain visual balance as the conifers grow.

If you'll bring in boulders or rocks to create your rock garden, look for a site that will naturally fit into the overall landscape. For example, a rock garden will probably look out of place in the middle of a lawn, but it looks great on a sloping site with a backdrop of shrubs or conifers. This berm planted with a variety of low-growers, evergreens, and shrubs appears to have always been a part of the landscape.

Create a calming mood in your rock garden by choosing a variety of fast-growing groundcovers in cool, analogous hues, such as blue and violet. In this site, the delicate blooms of Aubrieta 'Royal Blue' and Veronica 'Waterperry Blue' gently flow into each other, covering the stone steps with a soothing cascade of color.

Fill in tight spots between rocks with flowering plants to add a dash of color and give the rock garden a finished look. Saxifraga is an easy-to-grow crevice-dweller that grows naturally in mountain regions; here, its cheerful pink blooms complement the warm tones of the surrounding boulders.

You can let your rock garden flow seamlessly into the surrounding landscape, or add a border to separate it from nearby walkways or other garden areas. Here, a row of rocks separates the hillside garden filled with a mixture of plants -- including purple coneflower, geranium, daylily, and sedum -- from an informal pathway. The rocks along the garden's edge lend definition while complementing the rustic nature of the rock garden.

Perennials are common in rock gardens, but just as in other areas of the yard, annuals can bring an extra punch of color to a rocky site. These petunias look right at home among the rocks and add cheerful color to surrounding foliage. Other annuals to consider for rock gardens include dianthus, alyssum, and vinca.