6 Free Garden Border Design Templates Made for UK Gardens

If you've stood in front of an empty border with no idea where to start, you're in good company. Choosing plants is the part most homeowners get stuck on, and a blank flowerbed is genuinely intimidating.

A border template solves that. It tells you what to plant, where, and roughly how many. You adapt it to your soil, aspect and budget, and you have a working scheme in an afternoon.

The six templates below cover the styles I'm asked for most, from cottage to Scandinavian, with plant lists you can take to the garden centre.

What is a garden border design template?

A garden border design template is a planting plan that lists which plants to use, where to position them by height (back, middle, front), and what conditions they need. Templates give you a tested starting point for a border without having to design the planting scheme from scratch.

A good template includes a clear style direction, realistic dimensions, and around 8 to 12 plants chosen to work together through the seasons. The template doesn't replace a designer. It gives you a strong foundation you can refine to suit your own garden.

Why use a border template?

Templates aren't a shortcut. Even when I'm designing professionally, I work from style references and tested plant combinations rather than starting from a blank page on every project.

A good template helps you:

• Avoid the trial-and-error stage that wastes the most money on plants that won't thrive in your soil or aspect.

• Layer planting properly, with tall plants at the back, mid-height in the middle, and groundcover at the front.

• Keep year-round interest by mixing evergreen structure with seasonal flowering plants.

• Match plants to your conditions so you're not fighting clay soil or full shade.

• Estimate costs and quantities before you visit the garden centre.

• Get a coherent look rather than a collection of one-off purchases that don't sit together.

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For deeper background on the planning process, the RHS guidance on planning a border covers soil testing, plant selection and layout in detail.

Layered garden border design used in our garden design project in Kent

6 free garden border design templates for UK gardens

Read through, find the closest match for your garden, and adapt the plant list to suit your soil, aspect and existing planting.

1. Classic English cottage border

A relaxed, romantic style with a high proportion of flowering perennials and climbing roses. The look most people picture when they think of an English country garden.

Best for: sunny boundaries, full borders against fences or walls, traditional homes Suggested width: 2 to 3 metres Soil: well-drained loam Aspect: sun or part shade

Plant list:

• Back: Climbing rose (Rosa 'Gertrude Jekyll'), foxglove (Digitalis purpurea)

• Middle: Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia 'Hidcote'), catmint (Nepeta 'Six Hills Giant'), hardy geranium (Geranium 'Rozanne')

• Front: Lady's mantle (Alchemilla mollis), heuchera, geum 'Mrs Bradshaw'

Maintenance: medium. Deadhead through summer, cut perennials back in autumn.

2. Modern minimalist border

Disciplined planting that holds its shape through every season. A handful of repeated species rather than a wide variety, with a clear evergreen backbone.

Best for: contemporary homes, clean architecture, low-maintenance gardens Suggested width: 1.5 to 2 metres Soil: any well-drained Aspect: sun or part shade

Plant list:

• Back: Pittosporum tenuifolium clipped into shape, or pleached hornbeam for screening

• Middle: Hakonechloa macra (Japanese forest grass), Iris 'Black Knight'

• Front: Liriope muscari, Ophiopogon planiscapus 'Nigrescens' (black mondo grass)

For a contemporary example of how structured planting holds a garden through the year, my garden design project in Molesey shows disciplined planting choices around a modern patio that keep the layout looking considered all season.

Maintenance: low.

Structured planting in a garden I redesigned in Molesey

3. Naturalistic Scandinavian border

A modern naturalistic style with multi-stem trees, ornamental grasses and gravel as a key element. Looks beautiful from indoors through large windows, which is why it suits new build homes with bifold doors.

Best for: new builds, modern architecture, sites with large glass elevations Suggested width: 2 to 4 metres Soil: well-drained Aspect: sun or part shade

Plant list:

• Back: Multi-stem Silver Birch (Betula utilis 'Jacquemontii') or Amelanchier lamarckii, with Acer (Japanese Maple) as a feature tree

• Middle: Stipa gigantea, Calamagrostis brachytricha, Echinacea purpurea, Sedum 'Matrona'

• Front: shade-tolerant ferns (Polystichum setiferum, Dryopteris filix-mas)

• Accents: dwarf pines (Pinus mugo) in a gravel mulch, with natural stone boulders for weight

For a real-world example, my garden design project in Waltham Cross uses almost this exact palette: Silver Birches, multi-stem Amelanchier and Maples, ornamental grasses and shade-tolerant ferns, with gravel beds and stone boulders anchoring the layout.

Maintenance: low to medium.

Planted border of our Waltham Cross garden design project

4. Wildlife-friendly pollinator border

Layered planting that supports bees, butterflies and birds, with structural shrubs that hold the look in winter and a small blossom tree to anchor the back of the bed.

Best for: larger gardens, biodiverse-led plots, gardens for pollinators Suggested width: 1.5 to 3 metres Soil: any Aspect: sunny preferred

Plant list:

• Back: Crab apple (Malus 'Evereste'), Viburnum opulus, Buddleja davidii

• Middle: Verbena bonariensis, Echinacea purpurea, Achillea 'Moonshine', Salvia nemorosa 'Caradonna'

• Front: Thyme (Thymus serpyllum), hardy geranium, Erigeron karvinskianus (Mexican fleabane)

For an example of plant-rich, wildlife-led design where layered shrubs, perennials and grasses frame a usable garden, my garden design project in Dulwich shows what biodiversity-first planting looks like in practice, with a sculptural water feature and a sunny dining terrace at the heart of the scheme.

Maintenance: medium.

3D render of biodiverse border planting, from our Dulwich garden design project

5. Drought-tolerant Mediterranean border

A south-facing border for hot, dry conditions. Reduces watering through summer and works well finished with a gravel mulch rather than bark.

Best for: sunny south-facing walls, gravel gardens, dry sites, low-water gardens Suggested width: 1 to 2 metres Soil: free-draining; poor soil tolerated Aspect: full sun

Plant list:

• Back: Cistus 'Sunset', Phlomis fruticosa, Rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus)

• Middle: Lavender (Lavandula 'Munstead'), Salvia 'Caradonna', Stachys byzantina (lamb's ear)

• Front: Sedum 'Autumn Joy', Erigeron karvinskianus, creeping thyme

For a useful reference on how drought-tolerant planting can hold a whole garden together, my garden design project in Long Ditton uses drought-tolerant choices throughout, paired with clay paver paths and several seating areas.

Maintenance: very low. Trim Mediterranean shrubs lightly after flowering.

Planted border in our Long Ditton garden design project

6. Shade-tolerant textural border

Foliage-led planting for shaded boundaries, courtyard gardens or under tree canopies. Designed to work where most flowering plants struggle, with texture doing the visual work instead of colour.

Best for: north-facing walls, urban courtyards, under tree canopies Suggested width: 1 to 2 metres Soil: moisture-retentive, enriched with compost Aspect: part to full shade

Plant list:

• Back: Hydrangea quercifolia (oakleaf hydrangea), Fatsia japonica

• Middle: Hosta 'Sum and Substance', Brunnera macrophylla 'Jack Frost', Astilbe 'Fanal'

• Front: Polystichum setiferum, Dryopteris filix-mas, Heuchera 'Palace Purple', Tiarella

Maintenance: low. Mulch annually in spring to retain moisture.

How to adapt a template to your garden

Templates are starting points, not blueprints. Adapt them in this order:

1. Measure your border first. Note the width, length, aspect (which way it faces) and any obvious soil clues. Does water sit on the surface or drain quickly?

2. Confirm the conditions match. A drought-tolerant template will fail in heavy clay that holds water. A cottage template will struggle in deep shade. The wrong template doesn't get fixed by good planting.

3. Adjust quantities to fit. Use roughly 5 plants per square metre for perennials, fewer for shrubs. Multiply by your border's area to estimate the order.

4. Substitute, don't omit. If you can't source a specific cultivar, replace it with a similar plant rather than leaving a gap. Garden centres rarely stock the exact varieties listed in any guide.

5. Plant in groups of three, five or seven. Even-number plantings look stiff. Odd numbers feel naturalistic.

Common mistakes I see

The errors I see most often when homeowners use a template are practical, not stylistic.

Wrong width. A border under 1 metre wide can't carry layered planting. The plants end up in single rows that read as a stripe rather than a border. If you can't go wider than 1 metre, stick to a two-tier scheme (middle and front only) rather than trying to fit a back row in.

Mixing too many styles. Borrowing one cottage rose, one Scandinavian birch and one Mediterranean shrub gives you a confused border that never looks settled. Pick one template and stay with it for at least the first year.

Buying everything at once. A border builds up over two to three years. Buy structural plants and a small number of key perennials in year one, fill in year two, and adjust in year three based on what's thriving. Spreading the spend usually produces a better result than a single planting day.

Want a planting plan tailored to your garden?

A template gets you about 70 percent of the way to a good border. The last 30 percent is matching it to your specific site, your soil, your aspect, your existing planting, and the look you actually want.

I design gardens across London, Kent and the South East, and every project includes a detailed planting plan drawn up for the site rather than adapted from a template. If you'd like a scheme designed specifically for your garden, get in touch and we'll arrange a free site visit.