Free Garden Planner - Design Your Garden in 3D

A well-designed garden is not just about what you plant - it is about how the space is organized. Good layout decisions made before you put seeds in the ground will save you hours of maintenance and significantly improve your harvests over the life of the garden.

Sun orientation is the single most important layout factor. In the northern hemisphere, position your tallest plants (trellised tomatoes, corn, sunflowers) on the north side of the garden so they do not shade shorter crops. In the southern hemisphere, reverse this. Fincabout's sun slider lets you check shadow patterns at different times of day and year so you can verify your layout before planting.

Path design affects both aesthetics and productivity. Paths need to be wide enough for your body and tools - 45 cm minimum for walking paths, 60-75 cm if you need to kneel beside beds. Main paths should accommodate a wheelbarrow. Place paths so you can access every bed from at least one side without stepping on the soil, which causes compaction that hurts root growth.

Raised beds offer advantages for small gardens: better drainage, warmer soil in spring, defined growing areas, and reduced weed pressure from surrounding lawn or paths. Standard dimensions are 1-1.2 meters wide (so you can reach the center from either side) and as long as your space allows. In Fincabout, raised bed tiles snap to the grid so you can experiment with different configurations and see the total growing area in your statistics panel.

Companion planting is the practice of growing certain plants together because they benefit each other - through pest deterrence, nutrient sharing, pollination support, or physical complementarity. While some companion planting claims are more folklore than science, several combinations have solid research behind them.

The Three Sisters is the most famous companion planting system, developed by Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Corn provides a tall stalk for beans to climb. Beans fix nitrogen from the air into the soil, feeding the heavy-feeding corn. Squash spreads across the ground, shading the soil to retain moisture and suppress weeds while its prickly stems deter raccoons and other pests. This system works because each crop occupies a different niche - vertical space, soil chemistry, and ground coverage - without competing.

Pest deterrent combinations include basil planted near tomatoes (repels aphids and whiteflies), marigolds interplanted throughout the garden (deter nematodes and many flying pests), and alliums like onions and garlic near carrots (confuse carrot flies with their strong scent). These are not guaranteed pest eliminators, but they reduce pressure as part of an integrated approach.

Nutrient sharing works beyond the Three Sisters. Any legume - peas, beans, clover, vetch - fixes nitrogen that benefits neighboring and subsequent crops. Deep-rooted plants like comfrey, borage, and daikon radish mine minerals from the subsoil and make them available to shallow-rooted neighbors when their leaves decompose as mulch.

In Fincabout, you can place companion crops as adjacent tiles and use the seasonal view to plan when each species is active. This helps you identify timing conflicts - a companion that is harvested before the main crop needs it provides no benefit.