35 Herb Garden Design Ideas + Growing Tips

Spice up your menus with the zingy flavors of fresh herbs. You don’t need an elaborate herb garden design to work flavorful sprigs and leaves into your family’s mealtimes. Many herbs thrive — and yield stems for snipping — in containers. But if you yearn for a formal herb garden design, you won’t be disappointed. You’ll have beauty and harvest to share.

Pictured above, this slim-profile portable herb garden is ideal for small outdoor spaces. Amy Baesler of Her Tool Belt painted three lengths of gutter in robin’s nest blue then suspended them from a DIY stand.

Mediterranean herbs such as thyme, sage, oregano and rosemary grow well in terra-cotta clay containers because the material dries out quickly and provides great drainage. Group plants together that have the same growing needs — sunlight, soil and moisture. Herbs like oregano, rosemary, lavender, cilantro, fennel, and dill thrive in full sun. Mints, chives, parsley and sage can handle dappled shade.

This lively raised custom cedar wood veggie bed is teaming with radish, beans, carrots, parsley, kale, cabbage, Swiss chard and asparagus, while a chorus of potted herbs flourishes in the background.

The easiest way to create an herb garden design is to slip individual pots of herbs into one larger container, like this vintage wine crate that says “wine brings joy.” Add a few favorite herbs, including (clockwise from bottom corner) basil, thyme, rosemary, sweet woodruff and bay, and you’ll find that herbs bring joy, too. Growing herbs in individual pots lets you change your herb garden design at will, depending on which flavors are headlining in your kitchen creations.