Cottage Garden Ideas to Transform Your Outdoor Space

Cottage gardens are loved by people everywhere. This type of garden design brings old-world charm and romance to any landscape, city or country.

A cottage garden's storybook feel, with its jumbled sea of colors, is inviting and relaxing. Are you ready to be inspired to grow your own?

In this post, you’ll learn about creating a cottage garden, what to plant in it, and other cottage garden ideas.

Stop And Smell the Roses

Give yourself permission to slow down - take time to smell the flowers, pick flowers, and enjoy the beauty. The more we slow down and enjoy the small things, the less we actually need in life.

My garden is a place of solace, an escape from the tug of social media and technology. My aim is to inspire others to live healthier lives by growing a garden, too.

That’s why I share quality gardening advice, such as how to start a vegetable garden, design your dream garden, how to grow a container garden, raised garden bed ideas, and garden trellising ideas.

What is a Cottage Garden

The traditional cottage garden has been around for centuries. Originating in rural England, families living in villages and cottages grew flowers and herbs, accented with edibles, for beauty and food.

Cottage gardens are charming, densely planted, and informal, with a whimsical and wild feeling. They are distinctly different from the neat and symmetrical style of a formal English garden and a potager garden.

Cottage Garden Advantages

Choosing an informal garden style has many benefits.

If your main goal is food production, this may not be the garden for you. Cottage gardens aren’t designed for optimal yields, and overcrowding can cause issues like poor air circulation, fungal disease, nutrient competition, and increased risk of powdery mildew.

Key Elements of a Cottage Style Garden

This gardening style has no rules, but these key elements will help you achieve that quintessential charm.

• Dense Planting - Take normal "traditional" spacing and throw it out the window. Use high-intensity spacing to get as much as you can out of any size garden.

• Unstructured Design - The design aims to look naturalistic, seemingly ignoring common gardening tenets. You don’t need well-defined spaces.

• Pathways - Pathways should be meandering and informal, not geometric or angular. To add a whimsical feel, you can plant living ground covers around footpaths.

• Sustainable - Emphasize native, sustainable plants and low-maintenance perennials.

• Visual Interest - Add fun and interesting features unique to your garden.

How to Design a Cottage Garden

Cottage gardens are all about charm and surprise, and no two are exactly alike.

If you have already picked the perfect location for your garden, draw your design ideas in a garden planner or on paper to help you visualize and decide on a layout. Remember, curved lines and irregular features make your garden feel mysterious, like you'll find new things around every corner.

Use these steps to guide you in making cottage garden plans that are uniquely you:

1. Borders - Cottage gardens are usually not fully encircled by borders but often incorporate buildings and attractive fences. You may find it easiest to start your design at the garden's defined borders and work outwards from there.

2. Informal - Remember to keep it casual with winding paths and irregular shapes and features.

3. Interest - Plan things to add visual interest but keep it irregular. You can add structures like arched trellises covered in vines, picket fences, and garden sheds. You can also add flowering shrubs, birdhouses, lamp posts, water features, strings of lights, old wheelbarrows, art, compost bins or worm bins, bird baths, or other decorations that reflect you!

4. Seating - Incorporate places to sit and relax.

5. Map the Sun - Most cottage gardens have planting locations that range from shady to full sun because of their proximity to homes and trees. Sun mapping will give you a visual guide to see where you’ll need shade-loving plants and where you’ll need plants that thrive in full sun.

6. Quality Soil - Before you plant anything, prioritize the health of your soil! Soil is the foundation of every garden. Do a soil test and amend the soil as needed to get rich organic soil. Use mulch and wood chips to conserve soil moisture and promote healthy soil mycology.

7. Plant Types - Finally, it's time to choose what varieties to plant! Create a garden that is a feast for all of your senses. The goal is to plant many different plants close together to achieve a full and colorful garden all year.

What to Plant in Your Cottage Garden

What you plant in your cottage garden is completely up to you! Cover the soil with a unique mix of ornamental and edible plants.

Here are some suggestions:

Varieties that bloom at different times will keep the garden interesting throughout the seasons. While England may only get the occasional touch of snow (which means many cold-hardy vegetables survive the winter), in my Michigan garden, I have to be a little more creative. Varieties like juniper, dogwood, or holly can bring color to the garden even during a frozen winter.

I hope these cottage garden ideas motivate you to create your dream garden. Give yourself time to sit and imagine what it would be like and look at other cottage gardens for inspiration.

Most importantly, have fun with it and plant things you love in your cottage garden!