Home Design Trends: Boxwood & Beyond

Some of the most influential designers in the world are reinventing the use of boxwoods in the home landscape.

There are many reasons to love boxwoods in the home garden. Their evergreen qualities mean they are year-round providers of color and shape – even providing visual charm under a blanket of snow. Available in a host of sizes from miniature to large scale, they can form the backbone of almost any garden in any climate. And good news – deer are not interested in munching on them.

But it may be the versatility of boxwood gardens that is their most appealing quality. Gone is the fussy and formal geometry of the past – today’s best practitioners are using dramatic large scale proportions and breathtaking structure to set off naturalized trees and background plantings.

Australia’s garden superstar Paul Bangay epitomizes this style when he mixes classic parterre boxwood with wild roses or clouds of lavender. His thoughtful ideas about garden design and some great inspiration can be found in Paul Bangay’s Garden Design Handbook. 

British landscape designer Miranda Brooks, whose clients include Aerin Lauder, Oscar de la Renta, Anna Wintour and the Rothschild family, creates outdoor rooms where clipped box hedges and manicured globes coexist with magical natural forests. Her signature style is to invest a garden with elements of calm and order while leaving some space for wildness where not everything is pruned to perfection.

These designers’ works demonstrates that boxwood gardens can dazzle in any setting – from stark contemporary architecture as well as more traditional architectural styles.