A professionally designed residential front yard in the NC Piedmont, featuring a graceful curving stone walkway leading to a modern craftsman-style home. The landscape is composed of layered native plant beds with flowering perennials, ornamental grasses, and small understory trees, arranged on a gentle hill. Mulched beds contrast with a lush, drought-tolerant lawn panel. Soft late-afternoon sunlight creates warm highlights on the stone and foliage, with long, gentle shadows adding depth. Photographic realism, eye-level composition using the rule of thirds, with sharp focus throughout to showcase textures of bark, leaves, and stone. The mood is polished yet welcoming, conveying a boutique, high-end landscape design studio’s finished project.

Landscape Design · Hillsborough, NC

Inspired by Nature. Designed for You.

Custom landscape designs, installation, native plantings, edible gardens, and pollinator habitats tailored to your property, your lifestyle, and the unique ecology of the Hillsborough–Triangle region.

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✦  What We Do  ✦

Services rooted in beauty and ecology

From first sketch to final planting, every service we offer is designed to make your landscape more beautiful and more alive.

Custom Landscape Design

Thoughtful, site-specific plans that balance beauty and ecological function for your property.

Native Plant Gardens

Regionally adapted plantings that thrive in the Piedmont and support local wildlife.

Edible Gardens

Beautiful, productive beds that bring herbs, vegetables, and fruit within reach.

Pollinator Habitats

Gardens that hum with bees and butterflies year-round while looking effortless.

Sustainable Solutions

Rain gardens, bioswales, and permeable design that manage water and reduce waste.

Installation

Expert on-site work across the Triangle, from first planting to finished garden.

A professionally designed residential front yard in the NC Piedmont with a curving stone walkway, layered native plant beds, and warm late-afternoon light.

About the Studio

Ballard Landscape Design and Consulting is a landscape design studio based in Hillsborough, North Carolina, serving Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh, and the surrounding Triangle. We see landscape design as both art and environmental responsibility.

Native plants, pollinator habitats, edible gardens, and sustainable solutions aren’t add-ons for us. They’re core to how we work, thoughtfully, selectively, and in partnership with every homeowner we serve.

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Selected Work

Projects

A few recent gardens across the Triangle, each shaped by its site, its light, and the people who live there.

A finished Ballard landscape project featuring lush native plantings.
A meticulously designed edible garden with cedar raised beds full of leafy greens, tomatoes, and herbs beside a small brick patio in an NC Piedmont backyard.
A sustainable, modern front-yard replacement for a traditional lawn in the NC Piedmont, captured in photographic realism. A broad, gently sloping yard is filled with mixed native meadow-style plantings, bioswales edged with river rock, and a discrete rain garden collecting runoff from the driveway. A narrow, permeable paver walkway winds to the front door of a contemporary home. Late-afternoon, slightly overcast light yields soft, even illumination, revealing subtle color variations in grasses, flowers, and stone. Shot from a slightly elevated street-side angle, with balanced composition emphasizing the layered planting structure and stormwater features. The mood is quietly confident and forward-thinking, showcasing sustainable design solutions that still feel polished and intentional.
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Let’s Begin

Ready to Transform Your Outdoor Space?

We take on a select few projects across the Triangle each season. Let’s talk about your property and how a thoughtful, ecological design could bring it to life.

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