9 Fast-Growing Border Plants to Beautifully Define Your Landscape in Record Time
In a carefully planned garden, border plantings aren’t an afterthought. These plants are an essential part of your design, adding color, texture, and visual interest to in-ground and raised beds, as well as around walkways, trees, water features, and more.
Fast-growing border plants let you put the perfect finishing touch on any planting. Use pollinator-friendly plants to line formal walkways, add colorful ground coverings to the edges of rocky transitions, divide ornamental beds with medium-height hedges, or install imposing evergreens to create privacy for your porch or patio.
No matter the size or layout of your garden, these expert-recommended, fast-growing border plants will fill in the edges of your landscape quickly and beautifully.
Sedge Grass
Courtesy of Linda Vater
Sedges (Cyperaceae spp.) are low-growing, grass-like plants that come in hundreds of sizes and colors. Linda Vater, plant expert for Southern Living Plant Collection, recommends the EverColor ‘Everillo’, a grassy perennial. “[It] has vibrant, chartreuse-yellow foliage year-round that cascades gracefully from its base, ideal for creating bright borders in shady spaces where muted greens typically dominate the color palette,” says Vater. This adaptable, deer-resistant plant brings texture and movement to walkways, flower beds, and borders.
- Zones: 2 to 9
- Size: 10 to 36 inches tall x 10 to 36 inches wide
- Care requirements: Full to partial shade; moist, well-drained soil
Lily of the Nile
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Groups of tiny, tube-shaped flowers form spheres of eye-catching blooms on the Lily of the Nile (Agapanthus spp.) plant, often in blue, purple, or white. The upright growth habit works well to line the edge of a formal walkway, add height to a mixed bed, or anchor a pollinator border, says Vater. The flowers bloom—and attract hummingbirds—from mid-summer through fall.
- Zones: 7 to 11
- Size: 1 to 4 feet tall x 18 inches wide
- Care requirements: Partial sun; well-drained soil
Lilyturf
Low-growing lilyturf (Liriope muscari) mimics the look of grass—until it blossoms with pale purple flowers in late summer and early fall. “The narrow leaf blades of muscari provide a nice look that separates turfgrass from landscape beds,” says Damon Abdi, assistant professor of landscape horticulture at the LSU AgCenter. “Use this plant to create a defined border between landscape beds and turf areas.”
- Zones: 5 to 10
- Size: 12 to 18 inches tall x 12 to 18 inches wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; moist, well-drained soil
Holly
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Evergreen holly (Ilex) shrubs are a versatile choice for creating a privacy border around your property or garden bed. The plants come in various sizes and are famous for the bright red berries they sport during the fall and winter. For a large outdoor space, Abdi recommends the ‘Nelly R Stevens’ variety, which grows to a commanding height of 15 to 30 feet. It’s perfect for blocking views from the street and can self-produce fruit without requiring you to plant both a male and female plant.
- Zones: 6 to 9
- Size: 15 to 30 feet tall x 8 to 25 feet wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Red-Tip Photinia
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Add understated color to your border layout with red-tip photinia (Photinia x fraseri), a medium-sized shrub with multiple seasons of appeal, says Abdi. “In springtime, the new foliage has vibrant red growth that gives way to small, showy white flowers (which, according to some people, smell unpleasant),” he says. “Regardless, the bright red, new foliage contrasts well with the mature, darker green foliage and offers a unique option for a colorful hedge.”
- Zones: 7 to 9
- Size: 10 to 20 feet tall x 5 to 10 feet wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; well-drained, fertile soil
Wax Myrtle
Plant several wax myrtles (Myrica cerifera) in a row to create an aromatic wall of foliage filled with waxy fruit to draw your neighborhood birds. “The fruit, flowers, and foliage have a pleasant fragrance that some consider to be spicy,” says Abdi. He adds that the fruit is particularly showy in the fall when it has a blueish-white waxy substance encasing it.
- Zones: 7 to 11
- Size: 20 to 25 feet tall x 8 to 10 feet wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; moist, well-drained soil
Winter-Hazel
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Hardy winter-hazel (Distylium) shrubs provide evergreen color with seasonal interest. Abdi suggests the compact ‘Cinnamon Girl’ variety as an unexpected alternative to boxwoods. “The foliage of this small evergreen shrub stands out, particularly with the new growth that comes in shades of purple as it emerges and later turns to a pleasing bluish-green as it matures,” he says.
- Zones: 7 to 9
- Size: 2 to 3 feet tall x 3 to 4 feet wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Black Eyed Susan
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Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta) produces oversized yellow blooms and soft green leaves, adding color to your garden from June through October. This charming native plant creates a natural, pollinator-friendly border in your yard’s sunny spaces. But it’s not just pretty—black-eyed Susan plays host to the larvae of moths and butterflies while the seeds feed your local songbirds, says Mary Phillips of the National Wildlife Federation.
- Zones: 3 to 10
- Size: 24 to 36 inches tall
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; well-drained loamy or clay soil
Creeping Phlox
Jennifer Yakey-Ault / Getty Images
Low-growing creeping phlox (Phlox subulata) is a ground cover plant ideal for rock gardens, border pathways, and hard-to-reach sloping landscapes. It explodes in spring with a profusion of white, pink, and purple blooms. “[It] spreads quickly to fill in spaces and suppress weeds,” says Phillips. “Early spring blooms provide nectar for pollinators when other sources may be scarce.”
- Zones: 3 to 9
- Size: 6 to 8 inches tall x 12 to 24 inches wide
- Care requirements: Full sun to partial shade; dry, sandy, or rocky soil
