Landscape Design Ideas for Campuses

Research on green spaces and mental health has shown that people exposed to regular interaction with so-called “green spaces” or get some interaction with nature generally have better physical and mental health than their counterparts.

For this reason, landscape design plays an integral part in the lives of university and college students. A vibrant green landscape helps create a more conducive learning environment, improves sustainability, and can also enhance campus identity.

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the impact landscape design has on campus residents, as well as give you some ideas that you can implement to help improve the landscaping on your own campus.

The Importance of Thoughtful Landscape Design for Campuses

Well-designed and well-planted campuses can play a significant role in the health and well-being of both students and campus employees. Psychologists and educators have long suspected a link between exposure to nature and mental well-being.

This is partially why biophilic design has been making great societal inroads in the last decade and a half. Some of the ways that well-planted and designed campuses can have a positive impact include the following:

• Exposure to nature and green spaces has a positive role in reducing stress, managing anxiety, and overall improving mental health. This benefits not only students but lecturers and employees as well.

• When you invest time and energy into building a solid design, it makes the campus look more appealing, adding to the overall aesthetics of the campus. It can even contribute towards an overall brand identity for a specific campus or group of schools.

• A well-planned campus landscaping design can also make outdoor spaces more functional, allowing you to designate spaces for social activities, events, and even quiet areas for studying.

• Investing enough thought and planning into your landscape design can help make the campus more sustainable. You can incorporate ideas like gardening with native plants, building rain gardens, and even creating small food gardens.

When trying to get your LEED certification , sustainable landscaping is a critical component and can play a significant role in gaining sufficient credits.

Key Landscape Design Ideas for Campuses

While it may be simple to understand that good landscape design is critical, we also understand that the sheer amount of options may make it hard to choose. To help you build the best possible campus landscape, we’ve created a list of some of our favorite campus landscape design ideas.

#1: Create Multifunctional Outdoor Spaces

The first key idea that can help make your landscaping exceptional is to combine the power of modern facilities and nature.

For instance, you can create outdoor study areas to help students connect with nature. Rather than simple outdoor study areas, you incorporate shade structures and power outlets, thus allowing students to be in nature while still studying effectively.

Another excellent landscaping idea is to create flexible outdoor spaces that serve more than one purpose. Large, well-designed green spaces can be used for classes or lectures, group assignments, or outdoor events as the need arises.

One excellent way to create multifaceted outdoor spaces is to incorporate outdoor classroom spaces with sustainable features. These spaces help create a different and more relaxed atmosphere in the classroom.

Different universities have accomplished this in different ways, with some using pergolas to create these classrooms, while others used tents or large Wendy houses. They typically combine this concept with other sustainable initiatives like using solar light to light the classroom.

There are several different colleges and universities that do well with outdoor spaces like outdoor classrooms. Some examples include the Davis campus of the University of California, the University of Virginia, and Amherst University.

Sustainable & Eco-Friendly Landscaping

When creating a campus landscape design, it is a good practice to incorporate tenets of sustainability and environmentally friendly practices. Here are a few examples of good initiatives that you can use on your campus:

Bioswales and Rain Gardens

If you incorporate bioswales and rain gardens into your design, you can also improve water retention while building a sustainability feature. These two features work together to purify water and allow it to ingress into the ground.

Rain gardens are essentially gardens full of native plants that are watered using stormwater. Bioswales are swales, or channels, that capture water and encourage it to flow in a specific direction (towards the rain garden). The rain gardens purify water, removing biological contaminants, and allowing it to flow into the ground through their porous surfaces.

Remember to use native plants rather than foreign plants. Not only will they be adapted to your area, but they will also require less maintenance and have significantly lower water needs (in most cases).

Green Roofs and Walls

Green roofs and living walls are two other kinds of popular sustainable landscaping practices with significant advantages. Both ideas contribute toward the overall aesthetics of the campus while offering a range of secondary advantages.

Conceptually, versions of this concept may be either incredibly complex or ridiculously simple. In their highest form, green roofs consist of a membrane-covered roof pitch turned into a large growing space full of greenery.

However, rooftop gardens are a much simpler variation of this concept and rely on the use of planters or free-standing garden beds to design a garden on the rooftop. The advantages of this use of rooftops are that it can cut down on the building’s internal temperature, and help to offset carbon emissions.

Green walls are vertical structures built against existing walls and intentionally covered with living plants. They can have a significant impact on cooling and temperature control. However, you can benefit from this kind of structure without going for the highly complex version.

By using wall-hung planters, you can reduce the amount of surface area exposed to sunlight, offset carbon emissions, and create better insulation without the effort and cost demanded by full-fledged green walls.

Tree Canopies

When planning your campus landscape design, it is important to include a certain number of canopy trees. While smaller plants can be immensely useful and contribute much, larger trees are needed for shade and the role they play in air purification.

Here’s a quick overview of these concepts and their benefits:

Enhancing Walkability & Accessibility

When planning your campus landscape, it is essential to make all areas as accessible as possible. By incorporating well-planned pathways and pedestrian-friendly zones, you can encourage students and staff to walk from one place on campus to another.

These walks can help reduce stress levels, especially when surrounded by greenery. They are made accessible through the integration of appropriate signage and lighting.

In terms of accessibility, it is also important to ensure that your designs comply with the ADA standards for accessible design. Doing so will ensure that all students have access to the different parts of campus.

Your walkways can also play a vital role in the campus’s overall sustainability. By using permeable paving, they become a sustainable drainage system where water can permeate the ground.

Incorporating Smart Technology in Landscaping

An excellent way to make landscaping less labor-intensive and elevate the sustainability level is using smart tech.

Just a few ideas for incorporating this into your landscaping include:

• Using smart irrigation systems to reduce water use. These systems use tools like weather data or soil moisture levels to determine whether to irrigate.

• Installing solar-powered benches with charging stations so students can charge their appliances and E-bikes.

• Using motion sensors to control lighting on pathways, so that you’re not using power full-time, but there’s light when needed.

Seasonal & Climate-Responsive Landscaping

If you want your plants and landscaping design to thrive, you need to consider the climate and implement seasonal landscaping.

This means that you need to choose plants that thrive in your climate throughout the year, not just in certain seasons. You also need to adapt your landscaping to your regional weather challenges, which may include focusing on stormwater management in high-rainfall areas or using drought-resistant plants in dry states.

It also means that you need to design spaces so they’re available for use year-round, and not just in certain seasons. That may mean heating seating areas, offering rain protection for study spaces, or using covered pergolas for shade.

Enhancing Campus Aesthetics with Fiberglass Planters

One of the best inventions of the last century, in terms of simplified and convenient campus landscaping, the fiberglass planter plays a pivotal role.

Why Fiberglass Planters Are Ideal for Campuses

Fiberglass planters offer an array of benefits and advantages that make it easier to accomplish sustainable initiatives and accomplish the desired aesthetics. The advantages include the following:

Excellent Durability

Fiberglass has excellent durability and is highly resistant to weather conditions and exposure to the elements. Unlike many other planter materials, fiberglass is unlikely to fade, doesn’t tend to crack, and is resilient to temperature fluctuations and weather events.

This lightweight durability makes these planters an excellent choice for campus landscaping.

Low Maintenance Requirements

Some types of planters require high maintenance to keep them in shape. Fiberglass planters are the exact opposite, especially when filled with low-maintenance plants.

Their ease of use and minimal maintenance requirements make them a cost-effective option for campus grounds teams.

Lightweight Versatility

One of the most significant aspects of these planters when trying to create a comprehensive landscape design is the fact that they offer so much versatility in terms of style and design.

When you buy fiberglass planters from us, you can choose from over 100 different designs, as well as various sizes and colors, making it easy to complement any architectural style.

Sustainability Made Simple

Since fiberglass is made of glass, which is essentially a form of processed silica sand, it is a completely renewable material. This means that it has a relatively sustainable production process and that these products are ideal for eco-friendly initiatives.

The other side of it is that since fiberglass planters are lightweight and durable, they’re easy to use in these environments. For example, if you want to make a facsimile of a green wall, you can easily tack a wall full of lightweight fiberglass wall-hung planters and create a green wall within a few days.

Strategic Placement of Fiberglass Planters on Campus

When planning your campus landscape, place your plants and planters strategically. Some of the best places to do this include:

• Placing fiberglass planters around entryways and in main buildings to create a welcoming atmosphere.

• Using planters to define spaces and incorporate additional greenery into outdoor study or seating areas.

• Placing planters alongside walkways to guide pedestrian flow and enhance aesthetics.

• Using lightweight planters to create green roofs, walls, and terraces without adding too much weight to the structures.

• Incorporating biophilic design by using planters indoors in classrooms, hallways, and shared areas.

Best Practices for Campus Landscape Maintenance

Once you have comprehensive landscape design, you need to turn your mind towards maintaining the landscaping you’ve implemented. Many times, the benefits of landscaping are lost because the maintenance is inadequate.

For this reason, you should try to create a long-term landscaping plan to enable efficient scaling and improve cost efficiency.

Your plan should include a sustainable plan for fertilizing plants and controlling pests. If you rely on chemical fertilizers and toxic pesticides, it will significantly reduce the effectiveness of your design.

Another essential aspect of your plan is to schedule regular upkeep and maintenance for your plants.

This includes less complex and more standard practices like picking up litter and ensuring that leaves and plant waste are restricted to designated areas where they can decompose or are taken to compost piles that can be used to fertilize later.

It also includes scheduling routine seasonal maintenance, like pruning trees in the appropriate season (generally fall), repotting plants that have outgrown their planters, and ensuring that plants get sufficient water in the dry season.

We’d recommend having a full landscaping calendar that includes everything from weekly activities to seasonal maintenance.

Conclusion

There can be no doubt that landscaping plays an essential role in the lives of students and campus employees. From a reduction in stress levels to better physical and mental well-being, green spaces can elevate a campus to the next level.

The key is to create a landscape that is both functional and creative, blending the best of sustainability efforts, manageability, and beauty. Fiberglass planters help to accomplish this without the tedious work required for large, sprawling in-ground gardens.

Don’t wait, take your campus from drab to fab with Fiberglass Planters!