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Create your outdoor oasis with these garden ideas

Ramp up your garden this summer with these garden ideas for 2025.

22 January 2025

By Sophie Graham (Digital Content Producer)

Well maintained lawn with borders filled with colourful flowers. The garden overlooks the ocean and the mountains

Gardens are becoming more than just outdoor spaces, they’re extensions of our homes, designed for living, relaxing, and connecting with nature. Whether you have a sprawling yard or a compact balcony, this year’s trends are all about versatility, sustainability, and creativity.

1. Colourful Foliage: Plants with Personality

Forget green-on-green, 2025 gardens are bursting with colourful foliage. Opt for plants with striking leaves in shades of deep purple, bright orange, or variegated patterns. Add pops of colour with planters in bold tones or painted garden furniture.

2. Outdoor Rooms: Your Second Living Space

Wooden chairs surround a roaring fire pit which lets off and orange glow in the darkness of the night.

Cosy fire pits are great for entertaining when it gets a bit cooler.

Why stop decorating at your back door? In 2025, outdoor rooms are stealing the spotlight. Think comfy seating, cosy fire pits, and weather-resistant rugs that make your garden feel like an extension of your living room. Add string lights or lanterns for a magical evening vibe.

3. Vertical Gardening: Go Up, Not Out

For small spaces, vertical gardening is a game-changer. Use wall-mounted planters, trellises, or even repurposed ladders to grow herbs, flowers, or trailing plants. It’s functional, space-saving, and is ideal for balconies or urban gardens.

4. Water Features: Serenity in Motion

A stone water feature sits in the middle of a pond surrounded by purple and pink flowers

A beautiful water feature can really transform your garden into a serene space

Water features are making a splash this year, adding tranquillity to any garden. Whether it’s a sleek, modern fountain, a DIY pond, or a simple birdbath, the soothing sound of water instantly elevates your outdoor space. Bonus: they attract birds and pollinators too which can only be a good thing!

5. Wild Gardens: Embrace the Chaos

Neat lawns are out and wild, untamed gardens are in. Let your plants grow naturally with native flowers, tall grasses, and buzzing bees to create a thriving eco-haven. Wild gardens are low-maintenance, sustainable, and effortlessly beautiful plus, they’re a major win for local wildlife.

6. Grow Your Own: Edible Gardens with Style

Woman tends to her vegetable patch, a greenhouse and poly tunnel are shown in the background

Edible gardens are becoming more trendy

Edible gardening is more than just practical, it's stylish. Raised beds, chic pots, or even vertical herb walls make growing your own veggies and herbs both functional and fabulous. Plus, nothing beats the taste of homegrown produce. Plus you can share your harvest with your friends, the perfect way to show off (if they grow well that is).

Author

Sophie Graham

Sophie Graham is a regular contributor to Trade Me, bringing over seven years of experience in content creation and marketing. She’s written across a range of industries — from property and marketplace trends to music and tourism — always with a keen eye for what resonates with readers. Sophie is also the founder of musicandgigs.com, where she shares her passion for music and the industry that fuels it. Whether she’s writing about real estate insights or the latest gigs, Sophie brings creativity, clarity, and a genuine love for storytelling.