How to Design a Peaceful Sensory Garden

Gardeners care about how our beds and borders look, of course, but how does your garden make you feel? It's easy to create a sensory garden filled with fragrant flowers, textured foliage and other elements that connect us to nature by engaging our senses of sight, smell, touch, taste and sound. The garden becomes an outdoor wellness retreat that's refreshing and relaxing, a place that invites us to cut lavender flowers and inhale their fragrance, stroll barefoot over a path of smooth stone pavers or listen to the sounds of birdsong and rain pattering through the trees.

Interest in sensory gardens is growing. Zillow, a real estate marketplace company, spotted the trend in 2024, when home listings mentioning sensory gardens and pathways jumped 314% over the previous year. But these gardens aren't just for homeowners. They're found in schools, public parks, botanical gardens, healthcare facilities and other places where they're used for fun, education, inspiration, rehabilitation and therapy.

Dr. Eleni Nicolaou knows that sensory experiences are good for adults and children. She’s an art therapist and creative wellness expert at Davincified, an online platform that offers customized creative projects designed to be relaxing and therapeutic. “We spend so much of our time in our heads," she says, "rushing, planning, worrying, that having a space that gently calls you back to your surroundings can make a real difference to everyday wellbeing. A sensory garden is about creating an environment that helps people slow down and reconnect with the present moment."

A sensory garden can fit into any available space or in containers. “Small, considered choices, a fragrant plant here, a textured surface there, something that moves softly in the wind, can transform how a space feels,” Dr. Nicolaou says. “By thoughtfully engaging the senses, even the most modest outdoor space can become a calming retreat that you want to spend time in.”

Plant ornamentals, edibles or both in your sensory garden; annuals live only one year or growing season. For plants that come back every year, choose varieties that are hardy in your USDA Gardening Zone. Read on for simple tips can help you create your own sensory garden.

Different colors can make a sensory garden feel energizing or relaxing. Researchers say soft greens, blush pinks, creamy whites and pale blues and purples are soothing, like the hues you'll find in native wildflowers. Think peach-colored roses, white daffodils, shell-pink sweet peas or sky-blue delphiniums. Fiery reds, deep pinks, vibrant yellows and bright oranges are more stimulating, so to wake up your senses, opt for zinnias, hibiscus, nasturtiums, red hot poker plants and other boldly-colored flowers. Choose flowers with staggered bloom times to keep the show going, and don’t overlook multi-colored foliage. Bold-colored plants like caladiums, cannas, crotons and heucheras have striking leaves, while silvery-white Dusty miller and Artemisia, steel-blue fescue and green ferns feel more calming. If you include hardscape features in your garden, like sculptures, pots and planters, look for items made from natural, earthy materials like clay and wood, or heighten visual interest with containers in a kaleidoscope of colors.

A colorful garden can also attract wildlife you’ll enjoy watching. Pollen and nectar-packed plants invite many winged visitors, including beneficial insects like ladybugs. Put out the welcome mat for butterflies with asters, coneflowers and butterfly bushes, and provide host plants for their eggs and caterpillars, like milkweeds, dogwoods, redbuds, fennel and passionflowers.

Hummingbirds will zip in to drink from brightly colored salvias, trumpet vines, columbines, cupheas and other flowers. Adult moths often drop by to explore late-day or night-bloomers like moonflowers, four o’clocks and evening primroses. Plant bee balm (Monarda), willows, viburnums and other trees, shrubs and flowers to attract bees to pollinate vegetable plants you're growing. Just arrange those plants thoughtfully, so the bees won’t buzz too close to you.

You probably won't appreciate wild visitors like hungry deer and rabbits, but you may be able to limit their access by planting in raised beds or using fences and other physical barriers. Repellants that smell or taste bad to them are also options, along with motion-activated lights, sounds or sprinklers.

Want more wildlife? Look for fireflies after dark, pest-eating toads that like damp, shady spots and busy chipmunks.

“Plants with fragrance, soft texture, gentle movement, calming color or everyday usefulness can make a garden feel more restorative,” says Rebecca Sears, Ferry-Morse CMO and gardening authority. "Herbs are especially effective because they invite gardeners to slow down, touch the leaves, notice the scent and even harvest something simple for the kitchen or a cup of tea.”

Lavender she says, “is especially useful near a path, patio or seating area where gardeners can brush against the foliage and enjoy the relaxing scent,” which is said to contribute to a sense of well-being. Rosemary “adds a different kind of calm to the garden: structure, evergreen texture in warmer climates and a clean, piney fragrance," says Sears. "Its needle-like leaves are pleasant to touch and release scent when brushed or snipped.” Sears also recommends easy-to-grow chamomile for its apple-scented flowers. Chamomile is sometimes used in aromatherapy to lessen anxiety and stress.

Be safe, and never use plants that have been treated with chemicals in teas, essential oils and other preparations. Consult a health care professional if you're concerned about allergies, interactions with your medicines or other issues with plants.

Scented herbs aren’t the only choices for a sensory garden. “There are many ornamental shrubs with fragrant flowers, such as the Korean spice viburnum (Viburnum carlesii), noted for its early spring flowers and intense fragrance," says Andrew Bunting, VP of Horticulture for the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. Other perfumed plants have therapeutic qualities, he adds, like the sweetbay magnolia (Magnolia australis subsp. australis), a native of the U.S. Coastal Plain region. "(It) produces four-inch flowers sporadically from May to September, which have an amazing lemony fragrance.”

Sweet Olive trees (Osmanthus fragrans) are another good choice. Their small, white flowers are almost inconspicuous, but they have an intoxicating scent described as a blend of apricots, peaches and jasmine. Citrus trees like lemons, limes and oranges also have delightful perfumes when they're in flower. If you spend time in the garden after dark, Dr. Nicolauo suggests growing jasmine for its sweet, noctural fragrance. "Jasmine turns a quiet evening outside into something that feels truly restorative."

Lamb's ears (Stachys byzantina) have soft leaves covered in fuzzy, silvery hairs that invite touching, and they're especially popular with children. Wooly thyme (Thymus pseudolanuginosus) makes a charming groundcover and has a fine, plush texture that you can stroke or walk on barefoot. (Just keep foot traffic light, because wooly thyme isn't as durable as turf grass, and watch for bees that are attracted to this pollinator plant.)

Go beyond soft-textured foliage in your sensory garden. Look for trees with rough bark, like sweetgums (Liquidambar styraciflua) and bur oaks (Quercus macrocarpa), or the exfoliating bark of river birches (Betula nigra) and paperbark maples (Acer griseum). Some sedums feel smooth and waxy to the touch, and sensitive plants (Mimosa pudica) have feathery, green leaves that fold up and droop for awhile after they're touched.

Like foliage plants, many flowers are delightful to touch. While fresh rose petals feel soft and silky, strawflowers (Xerochrysum bracteatum) have a crispy, papery texture. They hold their stiff bracts and bright colors for a long time after they're cut, so you can keep enjoying them indoors in dried arrangements. Snapdragons (Antirrhnium majus) are named for their blooms, which resemble dragon faces, and their soft, puffy blooms are nice to touch. Kids love to squeeze the sides of the flowers together (gently, please) to make the dragon's "mouth" open. Crimson bottlebrush (Callistemon citinus) has feathery-soft flower spikes that feel good when you run them between your fingers.

Be careful to choose non-toxic plants that are safe to touch; bottlebrush, for example, is sometimes confused with bottlebrush buckeye (Aesculus parviflora), a toxic flowering shrub.

Depending on the size of your sensory garden or containers, you can grow many tasty fruits. Plant Alpine strawberries (Fragaria vesca), which produce small, sweet berries, in borders, pots or hanging baskets (they need sun, so avoid hanging them in the shade). They taste like a blend of berries, vanilla and tropical guavas and pineapples. Don't pick the berries until they turn deep red or their flavors won't be fully developed. You can even eat them straight from the garden.

Like Alpine strawberries, other strawberry varieties, as well as blackberries and raspberries, don't continue to ripen after they're picked, so they're also great for snacking on in the garden. Ideally, you should wash all kinds of berries first, to remove dirt, bacteria, mold spores and residue from any chemicals you've used. But don't wash them until just before you eat them. Washing too early leaves them overly moist, and they can spoil faster.

As a bonus for your sensory garden, many berries have a sweet scent that stimulates your sense of smell.

Small cherry tomatoes, mini peppers, cucumbers and sweet bell peppers are also delicious to pick and eat straight from your sensory garden, but like berries, it's safer to wash them in clean, running water before you snack. Sugar snap peas and snow peas also make for a savory snack, because the pods are edible. Some gardeners pull their mild onions to nibble on, but you'll need to remove the dirt before you munch. Others like the peppery taste of nasturtium flowers and just-picked chives, which have a light, spring onion flavor with a hint of garlic.

Sound isn't the same as noise, so create your sensory garden as far away from unwanted noises as possible, so you don't hear passing traffic, loud air conditioning units or neighbors running lawnmowers, leaf blowers and weed whackers. If you can't escape the noise, consider planting densely to help block it, or putting up a wall or solid fence. Adding a shed may help absorb and deflect sounds you don't want to hear.

Create a sensory garden to attract the birds you most enjoy. Plant layers of native trees, berry-producing shrubs and flowers to provide food for them, and listen for their songs. Install birdhouses for the species that live in your area, and hang feeders with seeds and fruits. Nectar feeders will draw hummingbirds, but they don't sing. They'll also draw orioles that make a bright, fluty whistle.

Add a birdbath for water, leave a small brush pile or wild corner for shelter, and sit back to hear the symphony on wings.

If you don't have a birdbath, try a fountain. Even small fountains can attract birds to your sensory garden. Just clean and refill them often with fresh water, so the birds stay healthy and keep coming back to sing.

Fountains themselves add musical sounds to your space. If your garden is near a creek, river, stream or shore, you'll probably hear relaxing murmuring, babbling, gurgling or splashing sounds. Water doesn't have to move much to help you feel refreshed; like white noise, it can lull and calm you with rhythmic or steady sounds.