Enchanting Outdoor Fountains That Make These Gardens Feel Like Paradise

 

Surrounded by beds of lavish flowers and lush, indigenous plantings, outdoor fountains lend tranquil and chic qualities to any fanciful garden. Their intricate carvings and elaborately tiled surrounds echo the serene scenes from the Grand Trianon and other great historic oases across the world, lending old-world grandeur to even the newest of landscapes. Furthermore, their hushed splashes of water and storied tiers have just the right amount of elegance to turn a beautiful outdoor space into a meditative sanctuary. Here, 23 charming outdoor fountains that will have you dreaming of verdant mazes and gorgeous foliage, no matter your design style.

Urban Life

In this West Hollywood garden, the landscape team of Hoffman and Ospina designed a simple stucco fountain to buffer the street noise. The buff-colored lime plaster ties together the Tuscan influences seen throughout the outdoor space and main home.

Farm Approach

An urn-like fountain, made with stone from a mini quarry found on the grounds of this bountiful New England garden, draws the eye to the circa-1732 farmhouse. A low privet hedge forms a traditional rondel around the fountain and Vinca minor ground cover.

Light Ambience

A rustic, double-basin fountain provides the quiet soundtrack for dining parties in the kitchen garden of Brooke and Steven Giannetti. The antique table is positioned to allow guests to look out onto the rolling hills of Ojai, California.

Thoughtful Details

In this Mediterranean-inspired garden in Malibu, California, landscape architect Scott Shrader repurposed a reclaimed wellhead to act as a fountain in the courtyard. Olive trees frame the pathway to a terraced overlook with views of the mountains.

Seaside Tranquility

Bordered by both the sea and mountains, this Montecito home is surrounded by natural beauty. Landscape designer Steve Gierke of Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects devised an elaborate garden plan that celebrates its surroundings while asserting architectural intrigue. The pebble mosaic amid Iceberg roses and boxwoods creates a sleek water path straight to the ocean.

European Sensibility

Houston-based landscape designer Herbert Pickworth took notes from this home's French-inspired architecture, originally designed by William Ward Watkins, to pare down the garden’s web of overgrown plantings. At the center of the garden, French fountains from the 1920s and formal arrangements of crepe myrtles and clipped boxwoods work in tandem to create a romantic getaway at home.

Classic Southern Charm

Ask anyone who has grown up visiting or living in the deep South, and they'll tell you that nothing quite beats the views from your own veranda. At this Greek Revival–style house in Georgia, architect Gil Schafer created a sense of contrast with loud, tomato-red furniture overlooking peaceful fountains pools, linear boxwood hedges, and a soaring pine forest.

Waves of Folly

Whimsy and joy flutter throughout this Houston escape designed by Curtis & Windham Architects, thanks in part to a bronze elephant fountain (Dan Ostermiller) and a Versailles-inspired pergola. Canary Island date palms lend vertical visual interest around the pool.

Urban Oasis

A lush emerald lawn, manicured hedges, and bubbling rectangular fountains invoke a moment of much-needed tranquility at this downtown Chicago manse. Design firm Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects planted an allée of mature maples and boxwoods in the parterre garden to make the space feel more traditional and match the home’s Irish Georgian–style architecture.

Lush Relaxation

Designer Bunny Williams solicited the help of this Palm Beach Mediterranean-style villa's original architect, Jeffrey W. Smith, to redo the pool and landscaping to establish a timeless outdoor space. This marble dolphin fountain from Withington and Company Antiques overlooks the hot tub with Palm Beach’s lush greenery as its background.