Paving Planting is a Design Trick Pros Love to Soften Garden Paths – Creating a Natural Transition From Home to Yard
With the right plants, it's also low-maintenance to manage
Instead of spending tireless hours trying to remove the weeds and plants that find their way in between your paving slabs, try embracing them. Paving planting is the trend that softens your garden path and maximizes your growing space, and the best part is it requires minimal maintenance once established.
It's a garden path idea that infuses some life into your yard's hardscaping for little effort. Think creeping flowering plants painting your slabs bright colors for spring and summer, and compact evergreens making your bare path look a little more exciting in the winter landscape.
It's actually quite easy to incorporate paving planting in your yard – there are just a handful of steps. To talk you through this trend, I enlisted the advice of a landscape designer. Here's what he says.
Article continues belowBest Plants for Paving Planting
When thinking about which plants to add to your paved area, there's a lot of inspiration that can come from rock gardens.
'If you want something with color or flowers, try creeping thyme (which you can grow with these creeping thyme seeds from Amazon) or blue star creeper (which is available to purchase at Walmart),' suggests gardening expert and landscape designer Curtis Atkinson.
'Both of these are good options, especially if you’re going for a more wild, natural look, and you have fairly large spaces between your pavers,' he describes.
Plants with shallow roots and those that enjoy more compact planting will thrive better in smaller paving gaps. For example, erigeron (which you can grow with these erigeron seeds from Amazon) and evergreen dwarf mondo grass (available at Nature Hills).
'If you want something more lush and green, look for Irish moss or clover (you can use these clover seeds from Amazon). These can tolerate average foot traffic, thrive in temperate climates, and take full sun,' Curtis says
These evergreen options can give your paving an enchanted fairy garden-feel, almost as though it's been there forever and has become encompassed by nature.
When choosing your paving plants, think about the sun exposure. If it's in direct sun, you may want to opt for landscaping with cacti and succulents, for example.
If your paving is located in shade all day, opt for ground cover plants for shade instead, like sweet woodruff (starter plants from Nature Hills).
Our guide to walkable ground cover plants has more ideas for compact plants that thrive in a high footfall area, as well as the best plants for a crevice garden.
The main thing to consider is how tall and wide these plants will spread. You want to avoid anything that will grow an upright bushy habit, blocking the walkway.
Curtis is the founder of Sunline Landscapes, Utah's premier luxury landscape design, installation, and maintenance firm with over two decades of experience serving the state's most discerning homeowners.
How to Plant Them
To incorporate your paving planting, you need to ensure it's a fit growing environment.
'Most plants that you would use between pavers need to be spaced 6-12” apart when planting. They also all prefer well-drained soil that is slightly moist,' says Curtis.
'All will require consistent watering while they establish their root systems,' he adds.
If needed, you can prep your planting area by improving your garden soil. Put down a layer of organic compost to help the plants settle in. This Miracle Gro all purpose compost from Lowe's is a good choice.
Bear in mind the plants that grow in landscaping with gravel or an alternative growing medium, too, like rock garden plants and alpines which prefer a gritty mix.
And for those that spread, take into account how much room they need before overcrowding the area to ensure they can perform well.
How to Maintain Paving Planting
Maintaining your paving planting, of course, depends on what you have growing there, but there are a few general rules of thumb Curtis advises to follow.
'Paver plantings like mosses and clover are not very drought-tolerant. However, plants like creeping thyme are much more drought-tolerant, and blue star creeper is fairly drought-tolerant once established,' he describes.
To stop your paving planting drying up and going brown, keep on top of watering. You could even use an irrigation system to make this more automated and low-maintenance (like this drip irrigation kit from Amazon).
As for cutting plants back, some paving plants will be more fast growing than others.
'Creeping thyme will need to be trimmed back a couple of times during the spring and summer, but won’t require much maintenance otherwise,' Curtis says.
'Creeping thyme doesn’t grow much higher than 4”, so heavy mowing isn’t generally necessary. Irish moss is very similar. It grows so low to the ground that they generally do not need any trimming or mowing,' he says.
Something to keep in mind is the spread of your paver planting. You want to avoid it overtaking so much that you can no longer see the slabs or use the path.
'Thin any plants out if they begin to invade areas you don’t want them,' advises Curtis.
You can also use garden snips (like these from Amazon) to give your paving planting a quick trim where necessary.
Nevertheless, embracing the planting spreading and going a little wild is the part of making paving planting look more naturalistic, so avoid unnecessary cutting back.
The majority of paving plants thrive in poor soil conditions, especially once established, so fertilizing may not be necessary. However, if you want to encourage more blooms for flowering plants, you can use bloom boosting fertilizer in spring (like this from Amazon).
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If you're looking for more inspiration around hardscaping, we have lots of beautiful front yard paving ideas and gravel patio ideas that may work for your outdoor space.
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