Plant Your Garden Steps for Beauty and Function

Steps may be the quickest way up or down garden slopes, but they needn't be mundane or purely utilitarian. Minimalist designs may call for clean stone and concrete outlines, but in traditional or smaller gardens, steps can feel like wasted planting space.

How to plant steps? Create ornamental features, soften hardscape, grow crevice-loving specimens, or blend steps into planting schemes. Often only weeds inhabit steps—"with broken dinner-knives," per Rudyard Kipling. But weeds' happy domicile shows a range of plants will thrive there.

Plant choice and maintenance vital where steps/pathways need good lighting and zero trip/slip hazards, especially for restricted sight/mobility. Plants should be creepers or low-growing, carefully selected for tread width. Keep this in mind before planting.

Planted Step Examples

Poured-concrete steps interplanted with Santa Barbara daisy (Erigeron karvinskianus, zones 6-9), blue fescue (Festuca glauca, zones 4-8), creeping thyme (Thymus praecox), Berkeley sedge (Carex divulsa, zones 4-10) leading to California front yard.

Cleft-stone steps become part of perennial border winding through. Planting creeps along treads, meets in center. Tread width allows easy passage without tripping/slipping/treading on plants.

Plants for this effect: creeping Jenny (Lysimachia nummularia, zones 3-9), prostrate Veronica (Veronica prostrata, zones 4-8), woolly thyme (Thymus pseudolanuginosus, zones 5-8). Cotoneaster microphyllus (zones 5-9) and C. dammeri (zones 5-8)—small-leaved evergreen shrubs achieving wanted effect with judicial pruning.

See more plants for your pathway

Steps within sedum mixture—like stepping stones. Granite blocks create conditions sedums relish. Larger plants including black mondo grass (Ophiopogon planiscapus 'Nigrescens', zones 5-10) colonize crevices at tread sides/backs.

Natural-stone steps softened by crevice plants between treads/risers and low adjacent border plantings allowed to encroach. To encourage suitable plants, leave space at tread back filled with well-draining compost/soil mix—account for this during construction to prevent settlement from root growth affecting stability.

Plant choice vital: consider ornamental level, space needs, crevice microclimate. Steps protect from wind/sun but act as storage heaters—daytime heat absorbed, released at night. Encourages tender species but creates dry crevice conditions. Irrigation may be needed, or select plants enjoying hot, dry conditions.

Suitable plants: compact/low-growing herbs (thyme Thymus spp., golden marjoram Oregano vulgare 'Aureum'); spring-flowering plants (coral bells Heuchera sanguinea, zones 3-9; sea pink/common thrift Armeria maritima, zones 4-8); succulent sedums and Sempervivum.

Designated planting spaces between treads—rather than side invasion. Single species dominates as feature, not just stairway.

Clump-forming habit perfect for this: smaller grasses (blue fescue Festuca glauca, zones 4-8; blue sedge Carex flacca, zones 4-9; variegated Japanese sedge Carex hachijoensis 'Evergold', zones 5-10; big blue lilyturf Liriope muscari, zones 5-11). Handle light foot traffic; need additional step or infrequent traffic areas.

Viewed from house: wonderful feature. Riser colors blend with house; softscape blends with surrounding plantings.

Simplicity: single species dominance. West Coast native Dichondra (Dichondra occidentalis) encircles clean poured-concrete steps.

Boxwood risers and stone steps—alternative to wayward crevice plants/grasses. Need routine clipping. Boxwood good for tight clipping but risks box blight (Cylindrocladium buxicola), fungal disease discoloring foliage, potentially killing plant.

Lawn softening steps in minimalist garden—far from planted steps. Wide lawn treads and stone risers create amphitheater feeling as steps drop from open seating, complementing contemporary house.

Grass steps could be meadow or naturalized bulbs. Correct grass choice = attractive, permeable feature handling heavy foot traffic.

Grassed steps needing no planting embellishment. Brick riser detail perfectly matches manicured grass treads.

Korean grass (Zoysia tenuifolia, zones 7-9) at extreme end of step planting. Attractive, slow-growing ground cover forming mounds/clumps. Handles foot traffic, mown 2-3 times yearly. Spreads by rhizomes (underground runners) into surrounding borders. Pink muhly grass (Muhlenbergia capillaris) and blue rye (Leymus arenarius 'Glaucus') border steps.