The Garden Trends Index
The key trends you’ll see in gardens everywhere this year
Gardens can vary wildly from home to home, coming in all shapes and sizes. Your garden can serve many functions, from being a place to get together with friends and family, to being a source of fresh food for the table, or even being a canvas for you to express your own artistic flair through gardening. Whatever the purpose of your garden, the way you design and maintain it is often a reflection of your own personality, making each garden a unique space.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, we’ve all been staying at home much more than we used to, and gardens have enjoyed a renewed surge in popularity. With this increase in interest, people have been keen to put their own personal mark on their green spaces and make them a more liveable and enjoyable part of their homes.
There are a myriad of different ways to improve your garden and make it a space that you want to spend more time in. Some might opt for eye-catching water features that add the calming sound of trickling water to their peaceful garden retreat, while others might want to add colour to their patio or pathways with colourful outdoor tiles or mosaic patterns.
Porcelain tiles are an ever-growing trend that come in many variations to suit your chosen style. Tiles can be used to create an eye-catching centerpiece or create a seamless transition from inside to out.
With so many garden design options, we were curious to find out which garden trends are the most popular in 2021. We’ve looked at several different factors to rank 40 popular garden trends by popularity. Which trends will come out on top?
The most popular garden trends of 2021
We’ve used Instagram, TikTok and Google search data to give each garden trend an overall score, allowing us to rank them 1 to 40. Here you can see the ten trends with the highest overall scores
Pergolas – Garden Trend Score: 9.11/10
Pergolas are the most popular garden trend of 2021, having received a score of 9.11 overall. Not to be confused with pagodas, a type of tiered tower common in many parts of East Asia, pergolas are a slatted structure for providing shade on patios and parts of your garden directly adjacent to your home.
Birdbath – Garden Trend Score: 5.07/10
Birdbaths are the second most popular garden trend of 2021, with an overall Garden Trend score of 5.07. Birdbaths are a fantastic addition to any garden, attracting all sorts of birds for the avid birdwatcher. Try putting up bird boxes and hanging bird feeders to turn your garden into an avian paradise.
Birdbath – Garden Trend Score: 4.57/10
Taking third place are raised garden beds which are great for growing a variety of plants, although they’ve become particularly popular with those looking to grow their own fruit and veg. As the soil is raised above ground level, the drainage is improved, and it also means that you can introduce a different type of soil to your garden if you wish to do so.
Other popular garden trends that scored highly include garden fireplaces, garden tiles and garden lanterns, all of which can be employed to create your own magical area for entertaining or hiding away from the world, whichever your preference.
If using tiles outdoors, it’s important to make sure that they are suitable. A thickness of 20mm is usually recommended as thicker tiles are much stronger and can handle being outdoors. You should also check that the tiles are non-slip, and have at least a slip rating, or “R rating”, of R11.
The top ten garden design trends on Instagram
Having looked at each trend’s overall score, we can now dissect the data by looking at each contributing factor individually, beginning with their popularity on Instagram.
Pegolas – Instagram Posts: 889,885
By far the most viewed garden feature on Instagram was pergolas, with just under 900,000 posts mentioning the beautiful structures. They don’t come cheap so if you’ve shelled out for one, it’s understandable that you’d look to show it off on the Gram!
Birdbath – Instagram Posts: 213,126
Birdbaths are the second-most popular garden trend on Instagram, with 213,126 posts. Birdbaths may have received a boost in popularity due to the growing popularity of wildlife-focused gardening, whereby people turn their gardens into excellent habitats for animals and insects.
Raised Garden Beds – Instagram Posts: 155,559
Raised garden beds are the second most popular garden trend on Instagram, with 155,559 posts. These raised beds are ideal both for portioning off parts of your garden for different plants or purposes and for protecting your plants from being eaten by voracious wildlife.
Other popular garden trends on Instagram show that people are keen to get creative by adding features both for their aesthetics as well as their functionality. For instance, by tiling outdoor areas you can create an indoor effect that is resistant to weather and nature, while they also allow for creativity with a huge variety of colours and patterns from terrazzo to terracotta. Alternative aesthetic additions include garden statues and sculptures, while practical additions include garden kitchens, which show just how much people are valuing their gardens in 2021.
The most popular garden trends on TikTok
It’s a similar story for which are trending on TikTok.
Pergolas – TikTok Hashtag Views: 94,400,000
Once again, the pergola takes top spot, and again they have far more views than any other garden feature, this time when it comes to TikTok. With over 94 million views on the platform, the videos featuring pergola don’t just show off some of the most stunning examples of these structures, but also feature step by step videos showing how they’re constructed.
Garden Gnome – TikTok Hashtag Views: 17,300,000
Birdbaths also came second for popularity on TikTok, with 17,300,000 views on the platform. Birdbaths are a great tool for capturing videos and images of garden birds as they land to drink, wash and cool off. All you need is a little patience, some good weather, and the ability to keep quiet and still.
Garden Bar – TikTok Hashtab Views: 9,900,000
Something which may not have had quite so much interest before the pandemic is the garden bar, which has racked up just under 10 million views on TikTok. With the pubs closed, lockdown brought out the creative side in many who decided to make their very own garden bars, which can now be enjoyed for many more years to come!
The most searched garden design trends of the last year
Social media aside, these are the trends that people are actively searching for on Google.
Raised Garden Beds – Search Volume: 2,680,500
Narrowly beating the birdbath to be the most searched garden feature of the last twelve months are raised garden beds, with 2.7 million annual searches. As well as being suitable for growing all kinds of produce, raised garden beds have proven popular with those with reduced mobility, as you don’t have to bend down as far to reach them!
Birdbath – Search Volume: 2,507,000
The birdbath returns one more time to take second place, having received 2,507,000 searches over the last year. Birdbaths can come in a huge range of shapes and sizes, from simple structures with a modern edge to classic plinths with intricate decoration, or even subtle raised pools that seek to blend in with the natural environment.
Garden Bench – Search Volume: 1,949,000
Garden benches placed third with 1,949,000 searches over the last 12 months. This stalwart feature of any garden is a great addition to your outdoor spaces, both aesthetically and functionally, and its popularity shows that people have been looking for more ways to enjoy the outdoors while at home.
Also receiving a lot of searches were garden gnomes, benches and sculptures, which demonstrate the plethora of ways in which you can turn your garden into a unique outdoor environment specifically tailored to your preferences.
Full Overall Ranking
Having highlighted the top-performing trends, both overall and by category, here is the full list of featured garden trends, ranked according to their overall score.
The most popular types of garden
Having looked at specific garden trends, we wanted to take a quick dive into some of the most popular types of garden. Here we can see which overarching garden themes have caught people’s attention.
Fairy Garden Garden Score: 7.62
The most popular type of garden currently is the fairy garden, which achieved a total Garden Score of 7.62. This whimsical way of gardening aims to create a magical environment in your garden and can incorporate many decorative elements from porcelain toadstools to little fairy doors attached to trees.
Vegetable Garden Garden Score: 7.45
In second place, with a Garden Score of 7.45, is the vegetable garden. This practical garden type is popular not just for the huge amount of fresh, organic vegetables that you can produce, but also for the mere act of growing the stuff. These gardens make excellent family projects and are a great way of getting kids involved in gardening and the outdoors.
Flower Garden Garden Score: 6.44
Taking third place is the ever-popular flower garden, with a Garden Score of 6.44. This classic type of garden is a great choice both visually, for the bright array of colours and interesting shapes, and for the cacophony of scents that a varied flower garden brings. These floral gardens are also excellent for attracting pollinators that in turn attract birds and other wildlife to your garden.
Methodology
We wanted to find out which garden trends are the most popular in 2021. We first built a list of popular garden trends by scouring the internet for inspirational articles and lists on the subject. Once we had a substantial list of various garden trends, we decided to collect data from Instagram and TikTok, as well as Google search data sourced from Google Keyword Planner.
For Instagram, we found the relevant hashtag for each trend and recorded the total number of posts that used it. Similarly, for TikTok, we used investigated hashtags to record the number of views that each one had received on the platform. For Google search data, looked at UK specific searches over the last 12 months (August 2020 to July 2021), and recorded the total number of searches for the year.
We then combined these three metrics in a single score that treated them each with equal weighting. This allowed us to rank the trends according to their overall popularity online, while also highlighting their performance in each individual measure.