2025 Trendscapes That Wow

Inspired by Yardzen | Built by Belgard

In 2025, outdoor living spaces are no longer an afterthought—they’re essential extensions of your home. Two leaders in landscape design and hardscaping, Yardzen and Belgard, have joined forces to examine their collective data on customer preferences and showcase outdoor living trends that best bring those design visions to life.

2025 Outdoor Living Statistics: What Homeowners Want Most

Homeowners are pushing their outdoor spaces to do more and look better than ever. The landscape design data reveals compelling insights about backyard transformation trends:

1. Outdoor Structures & Shade Solutions: Nearly 3 in 10 homeowners now want pergolas—a 28% jump as families seek covered outdoor spaces that work rain or shine. These outdoor structures create defined zones while providing essential weather protection
2. Outdoor Kitchen Trends: Built-in outdoor kitchens jumped 18% as homeowners discover that cooking outdoors doesn’t mean sacrificing functionality—it’s about expanding their entertaining footprint beyond traditional indoor dining
3. Fire Features & Gathering Spaces: More than half of all outdoor projects now include fire features, with homeowners telling us firepits and fireplaces have become the new “living room focal point” for outdoor spaces
4. Garden Design & Sustainability: Raised Garden bed requests grew 21% as homeowners embrace “garden-to-table” living, wanting fresh vegetables steps from their outdoor kitchens
5. Water Features & Sensory Design: Nearly 1 in 4 projects now includes water features—from simple fountains to statement water walls—as homeowners seek the calming sound and cooling effect of moving water
6. Hardscaping & Pathways: Pathway requests increased 24% as homeowners move beyond “destination” yards to create “journey” landscapes with multiple discovery zones and sitting areas
7. Pool Alternatives & Compact Luxury: Compact pools surged 35% as homeowners realize they can get the luxury pool experience without surrendering their entire yard—perfect for smaller lots and year-round use

Explore these five “trendscapes” that translate those insights into real-world outdoor living spaces, each paired with specific products and materials that make the look possible.

Graphic flooring patterns are transforming outdoor living spaces in a big way. A herringbone paver design using contrasting pavers turns hardscaping into functional artwork while guiding traffic flow through your outdoor space. Chevron paver patterns turn a basic patio into a stunning artscape that rivals any indoor flooring design.

Paver Design Techniques: Utilizing geometric shapes and a mixture of colors emphasizes the creativity that can be achieved when building pattern-playing patios. Using larger-format slab pavers breaks up the design and mimics the indoor trend of larger format flooring, allowing for the outdoor space to be a seamless extension of the indoor living space.

Design Integration: Most homeowners are now framing a patio hardscape pattern with an inlay border to mimic the look of an area rug, and by adding a fire feature in the center to create a built-in social anchor—more than half of all projects now include fire elements.

Product Spotlight: Creating stunning patios by utilizing Belgard’s Geometric Shapes in Parallelogram or Hexagon means that patterns can be used both indoors and outdoors.

Limited square footage breeds creativity in outdoor design. Rooftop and terrace designers are maximizing small outdoor spaces by lining outdoor living perimeters with Belgard’s Artforms™ built-in benches, planters, and storage solutions so the center stays flexible for morning yoga or moonlight cocktails.

Compact Pool Trends: The compact luxury trend is reshaping how we think about backyard pools—compact pools surged 35% as homeowners realize they can get the luxury pool experience without surrendering their entire yard. Plunge pools and stock-tank pools deliver the splash without hogging real estate, perfect for smaller lots and year-round use.

Biophilic Design Elements: Biophilic elements and textures are typically brought into rooftop spaces to create the sense of a natural environment, even without a true proximity to nature. This microspace design technique is also finding its way into ground-level urban environments and the ever-shrinking lot lines of suburban yards.

Material Mixing: Add even more appeal to these small outdoor spaces by mixing materials such as integrating decking for wall cladding or stone wall veneers, creating visual interest and texture variation in compact areas.

Clean lines, oversized slabs, and a deliberately restricted color palette create a gallery-calm backdrop that lets outdoor furniture and plant silhouettes shine. Try adding texture and using monochromatic design with Belgard’s Dimensions Paver—one of their most versatile products for contemporary outdoor spaces.

Gray Paver Trends: Despite the return of warm tones in outdoor design, 7 out of 10 homeowners still choose gray pavers, valuing the sophisticated neutral backdrop that makes colorful plantings and outdoor furniture pop without competing for attention. This timeless color choice provides flexibility for changing décor and seasonal updates.

Texture Variation Techniques: Designers keep monochromatic paver designs interesting with subtle finish shifts—flamed texture next to smooth surfaces, shot-blasted beside polished finishes, and laser-straight joints that emphasize scale and precision in the hardscaping.

Enhanced Paver Technology: Paver enhancements like Belgard’s Durafusion Technology can add richer saturation to the varying tones of a monochromatic design, taking understated elegance to a new level while maintaining the sophisticated simplicity that defines this trend.

City backyards must multitask, so 2025’s urban lounge is built from building block modulars: outdoor kitchens and multi-functional benches that morph into fire-pit nooks, and oversized pavers that reduce grout lines for a “bigger-than-it-is” feel in compact urban spaces.

Color Palette Consistency: This type of outdoor space typically follows the gray or greige paver palette of the previous trendscape, maintaining that sophisticated neutral foundation that works well in urban settings.

Function-Stacking Design: What sets urban modular lounges apart is function-stacking multiple experiences into one integrated outdoor space. With built-in outdoor kitchens jumping 18% as homeowners expand their entertaining footprint, these spaces seamlessly link cooking, seating, storage, heating, and dining into one cohesive outdoor room that maximizes limited square footage.

Modular Flexibility: The modular approach allows homeowners to reconfigure their outdoor living space based on the occasion—from intimate dinners to larger gatherings—making the most of every square foot in urban environments.

Despite 7 out of 10 homeowners still choosing gray pavers for their outdoor spaces, warm tones are making a comeback, particularly in mountain and woodland regions. This mountain-modern trend can be effectively achieved with both stone-textured concrete pavers and porcelain pavers that replicate the look of natural oak or acacia without the maintenance requirements of real wood.  Belgard’s Noon Porcelain Paver combines the warmth of real wood while holding all the strong characteristics of porcelain.

Natural Element Integration: Designers pair these warm paver palettes with densely layered plantings, water features, and natural stone accents. This approach reflects the growing desire for sensory-rich outdoor spaces—nearly 1 in 4 projects now includes water features for their calming sound and cooling effect, while raised garden bed requests grew 21% as homeowners embrace “garden-to-table” living.

Multi-Sensory Design: These natural accents bring sound, scent, and seasonal color into the outdoor space mix. The result feels both lodge-cozy and architecturally crisp, creating outdoor living areas that engage all the senses while maintaining sophisticated design integrity that complements mountain and woodland home architecture.

Seasonal Appeal: The mountain-modern warmth trend particularly appeals to homeowners who want their outdoor spaces to feel connected to the natural landscape while providing year-round visual interest through varied textures and earth-tone color palettes.

These five outdoor living trendscapes represent the evolution of backyard design from simple patios to sophisticated outdoor rooms. Whether you’re drawn to the graphic appeal of pattern-play patios, the efficiency of rooftop renaissance designs, the timeless elegance of elevated simplicity, the functionality of urban modular lounges, or the warmth of mountain-modern spaces, each trendscape offers proven solutions for creating outdoor living areas that extend your home’s functionality and style.

Key Takeaways for 2025 Outdoor Design:

• Pergolas and shade structures are essential for year-round outdoor living
• Fire features serve as focal points in more than half of all projects
• Compact pools offer luxury without sacrificing yard space
• Water features and raised garden beds create multi-sensory experiences
• Gray pavers remain the most popular choice for their versatility
• Built-in outdoor kitchens expand entertaining possibilities

Ready to bring these trends to your outdoor space? Explore Belgard’s complete collection of pavers, outdoor living products, and design solutions to create your own 2025 trendscape.

Use these trendscapes as mix-and-match building blocks. Color-rich patterns, built-in flexibility, monochromatic sophistication, modular urban design, and nature-texture warmth can be combined to fit any footprint, climate, or budget—ensuring your next yard isn’t just on-trend, but truly livable and wow-worthy.