Product Description

Better Home and Gardens Landscaping and Deck Designer 7.0 provides even more tools for all outdoor projects including Landscaping, Decks & Patios, Water Features, Outdoor Living, Site Planning and Cost Estimating. Find your plants with a newly designed search tool. Import your own photos and arrange plants exactly the way you want. Landscaping templates quickly place pre-arranged landscaping beds. Terrain Wizard imports the specifications of your terrain. Choose from a Library of more than 5,500 items for your designs, including over 2,000 plants. The Exclusive Better Homes and Gardens Plant Encyclopedia and Plant Hardiness Zone Reference maps are included.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3309 in Software
• Brand: Chief Architect
• Released on: 2006-01-15
• Platforms: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 98, Windows 2000
• Format: CD-ROM
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds

Features

• Find your plants with a newly designed search tool - Search according to shade/sun requirements, growth attributes and more
• Import a photo and add landscaping, create an outdoor living space or design the exterior of your home
• Add water features to your landscape such as pools, ponds and streams
• The Growth Slider tool shows what your plants will look like in 0-20 years
• Choose from a Library of more than 4,000 items, including over 1,500 plants

Amazon.com
Better Homes and Gardens Landscaping and Deck Designer 7.0 is the latest in outdoor design software by Chief Architect. Planning the perfect outdoor living space has never been easier with powerful tools for landscaping, decks and patios, site planning, and cost estimation. Choose from a variety of over 1,500 plants with Plant Chooser and start designing today!

Plan and design the perfect outdoor living space Watch Product Video

Outdoor living designs

Over 2000 plants

Deck and patio design

Plant hardiness zone maps

Garden and landscaping templates

Powerful Design Software
Plan and design the perfect outdoor living space! Landscaping and Deck Designer makes it easy to quickly design the virtual look and feel of your backyard, deck, patio, pool or any outdoor project. Just point-and-click to add pre-arranged landscaping beds and any of over 4,000 library items to your design. Choose from an array of terrain feature and design tools. It's quick and it's easy!

When you need inspiration and ideas for your design, just turn to the Design Inspiration Gallery for help. Look through a collection of beautiful photographs to spark your creativity. Or get expert advice, tips and techniques from the editors of Better Homes and Gardens magazines. We've gathered all the information and inspiration you need!

Landscaping and Deck Designer makes it easy! Use valuable resources like Plant Chooser, Design Planning Center and over 2,000 plants, trees and shrubs to place and arrange in your outdoor living space.

Landscaping

• Plant Chooser--Find the plant you want with this newly designed search tool! Search according to shade and sun requirements, growth attributes, deer resistance, ease of growth and, much, more!
• Exclusive Design Planning Center for expert design advice, tips, and guidelines.
• Landscaping templates designed by Better Homes and Gardens quickly places pre-arranged landscaping beds.
• Terrain Wizard imports the specifications of your terrain.
• Choose from a Library of more than 4,000 items for your designs, including over 1,500 plants.
• Design and visualize in 3D, including Virtual Tours.
• Import your own photos of houses, plants, people, and more.

Decks and Patios

• Design single or multi-level decks with Deck Designer tools, complete with automatic deck framing.
• Patio Design assigns materials like concrete, brick, or Cultured Stone.
• Create retaining walls that follow the shape of your terrain.
• Layout your deck, add stairs, place and arrange outdoor furniture.
• Deck foundations automatically generate to match sloped lots.
• Quickly add water features to your landscape with round and kidney shaped ponds and stream tools.
• Automatic deck railings with height adjustments.

Outdoor Living

• Use the Design Inspiration Center with a gallery of images to help plan your landscaping and outdoor living space.
• Create custom landscaping plans in 2D and 3D.
• Choose from a Library of more than 4,000 items.
• Material Painter allows you to apply materials to individual items--change the color of your patio set, texture of your flooring, and more.
• Fence Designer tools let you click-and-drag to follow the shape of your yard.
• Design the exterior of your home or import a photo and add landscaping.

Site Planning & Estimating

• Landscape design tools easily create hills and valleys for custom landscapes.
• Use the Growth Slider tool to see what your plants will look like in 0-20 years.
• Use powerful Fence, Garden, Driveway, Path, and Terrain Feature tools.
• Create plot and perimeter plans; automatically generate a 3D model of your actual terrain.
• Automatically generate a materials list to estimate costs.
• Sprinkler Designer tool easily lays out sprinkler zones.

No Design Experience Needed!
Design it and enjoy it! Use over 3,000 integrated tools:

Create custom landscaping plans in 2D and 3D

Use over 3,000 integrated tools

Automatic Building Tools

• Create automatic framing for decks
• Automatically generate roofs, dimensions, foundations, stairs, railings and new floors
• Automatically create a full 3D overview of your landscaping plans

Library Content

• Over 4,000 items in the built-library including furniture, fixtures, lighting and more
• Over 2,000 realistic plants
• Brand names such as Benjamin Moore paints, Cultured Stone and more
• Additional plants can be found in the Bonus Plant Library

Dimensions

• One-Click automatic dimensions
• Dynamic Dimensions--displays dimensions as walls or decks are drawn

Landscaping

• Pre-Designed garden beds
• Over 2,000 realistic plants
• Import photos of your own plants
• Plant Encyclopedia--for detailed plant descriptions
• Plant Chooser to quickly locate and learn about plants
• Plant Hardiness Zone maps
• Advanced plant searching by sun, shade, watering, deer resistance and more
• Grow your plants 0-20 years!

Terrain Tools

• Automatic Terrain Perimeters--customize to define your specific plot
• Add elevation points and elevation lines for custom contours
• Create Terraces with retaining walls
• One-Click hill and valley tools

Sprinkler Design

• Sprinkler Design tools help you lay out sprinkler systems
• Show sprinkler coverage areas
• Adjust sprinkler coverage area
• Choose from a library of sprinkler heads

Project Cost Estimating

• Accurate materials calculations for concrete, lumber, plants and more
• Automatic cost estimations and materials list
• Assign costs for materials: descriptions, quantities, unit costs and more

Customer Reviews

Pedestrian Software for Pedestrian Landscapes
I picked this up in the hopes of visualizing some possible landscape options for our front and back yard without having to pay a professional landscaping firm for a consult.

First, the good. The tutorial videos are straightforward, easy to follow, and easy to learn from. The user interface is also pretty good, and I managed to make a reasonable approximation of our house in under 20 minutes. There's also a ton of trees, plants, shrubs, and so on, and the "zone finder" is very helpful in narrowing down what will grow in your particular area.

Now the bad. If your yard is at all hilly in an unusual way, that is, if it's not perfectly flat or gently sloped, you're going to have a nearly impossible time getting your yard laid out with this software unless you have a degree in cartography. I consider myself pretty bright, and pretty adept with maps, and I still cannot manage to lay out my yard correctly with this software. Given, I have an unusual yard. The driveway slopes down, but the front yard remains level until it hits a 5' retaining wall. The back yard has at least three distinct levels. Still, this software claims it can handle odd yards, but it does a poor job at it.

Second, if your tastes in landscaping run to the extreme, hire a professional. There's plenty of "garden variety" gardens in this software, but if you're looking for unusual water features, perhaps asian-inspired accents (very popular here in the Pacific NW), look elsewhere. While heavy on plants, decks, and lawn furniture, anything unique or slightly out of the ordinary isn't included here. My own design called for a basalt fountain. Not to be found, even for download on the website. And oddly shaped stone patios? Don't even try, unless you want to individually model every stone. You may as well just skip the software and get right to real landscaping.

For a vast majority of people going with very tried and true, non-experimental and non-extreme landscaping designs, this will probably be very adequate software. Want to arrange some flowers, trees, and bushes on your mostly flat yard? This is money well spent if you have no talent with pen and paper. However, if you're looking for a solution to unlock your hidden creatvitiy, look to a professional, or stick with your existing artistic skills in the medium of your choice.

Landscaping Made Easy!
I am enjoying this product. It was not hard to get the basics set up, except for the elevation levels for the terrain. However, with some experimenting and some reading, I was pretty much "designing" within a few days (I work, so this was play time). I am not terribly computer savy, but was able, through trial and error, to use the software in a relatively short period of time.

Main drawback is the limited number of plants in the menu. Most of the standard plants are available, but I am looking for a download that would bring in additional plants.

All in all, I feel that if I can do this, and enjoy it as much as I have, just about anyone can feel confident about buying it. I am pleased.

Good software for basic designs
The software has good tutorials and is fairly easy to use. It was difficult trying to layout a non-square plot plan. I would have liked a larger tree / plant selection for my area (Colorado) as I live in a covenant controlled community that only allow certain types of landscaping. Overall a good piece of software.