8 Inspirational Commercial Landscape Examples in Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia (And What Property Managers Can Learn From Them)
~7 mins
The next time you drive past landscaping that makes you think, “wow,” go one step further and think, “How can I do that?”
When it comes to great commercial property landscaping ideas, it’s ok to borrow.
Level Green Landscaping clients have inspiring outdoor features worth noticing, and maybe borrowing for your own property.
Let’s take a look at a few examples that might inspire you, including:
1. Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in Annapolis Md.
Inspiration: Think big with flower displays and on-brand attractions.
Where to see it: 550 Taylor Avenue off the campus of the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.
The Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium shows great pride of place in their patriotic landscaping, with great commercial landscape ideas for Maryland.
It’s the home stadium of the Navy Midshipmen college football and lacrosse teams and also serves as a memorial to the Navy and Marine Corps.
Flowers throughout the stadium property are blue and gold, representing the Navy school colors. Varieties are smartly selected that bloom in the peak of football season.
A centerpiece of the landscaping is a giant N for Navy emblazoned on a hillside, created totally of planted flowers.
Masses of white begonias create the letter in summer, replaced by a mix of blue and white violas in the fall.
Those same flowers brighten flower beds throughout the property, welcoming visitors at entrances, surrounding flag poles and flanking the stadium scoreboard.
New flower installations happen each spring and fall to keep beds bright and impressive.
The stadium landscaping also goes big with impressive aircraft displays. Fundraising is in progress for the next big project for the stadium’s memorial — the addition of a U.S. Marine Corps Harrier Jet. Level Green crews will take charge of the installation and its surrounding landscaping. It will join an existing memorial that features a U.S. Navy Blue Angels jet, near the main entrance to the stadium parking lot.
The lesson here: lean into your brand and traditions when it comes to your landscaping. And don’t be afraid to think big.
2. The Boro in Tysons, Virginia
Inspiration: Seasonal color creates a powerful impact in urban settings.
Where to see it: 8350 Broad St., Tysons, Va.
It’s easy for an urban development like The Boro to be dominated by towers of shimmering glass and hard concrete. But here, bright bursts of flowers steal the show, adding welcome color, softness and intrigue.
This premier mixed-use development includes luxury high-rise apartments; sleek glass office towers; intriguing restaurants and shops and a vibrant urban park.
Huge drifts of hot pink begonias are impossible to ignore, planted in masses that stretch in front of storefronts and restaurants in long raised planters for impressive impact. The mass plantings offer great commercial landscaping inspiration for Northern Virginia.
In addition, tall sleek planters wow with combinations of spiky purple yucca leaves, hot pink and green caladium and the cascading softness of chartreuse creeping Jenny spilling over the side.
The Boro gets new seasonal color flowers twice a year, in spring and fall.
It’s a big deal. Level Green crews typically plant nearly 10,000 flowers and plants at The Boro.
The lesson here: annual seasonal color makes a massive impact, especially in a hard-edged cityscape of glass and concrete.
3. Columbia Association
Inspiration: Sustainability efforts shine through in this Maryland landscape design.
Where to see it: The famous planned community is located in central Maryland, 20 miles southwest of Baltimore, 25 miles northeast of Washington DC and 30 miles northwest of Annapolis.
Columbia, Md. has been in the public eye ever since the innovative community was founded back in 1967. It’s a master-planned city with easy access to shops, schools, and open spaces. The goal: a model for cities of the future. Columbia is often ranked among the best places to live in the U.S.
So the landscaping at this community of more than 100,000 people has to be impressive. But sustainability is important to this groundbreaking HOA community, too. How do they achieve both?
Special Attention to Turf Care
The community’s much-used lakefront lawn gets occasional weed control and fertilizer as part of landscape maintenance, but not at the frequency of a traditional turf care program.
That means plenty of irrigation and more frequent aeration and overseeding than most lawns get. Aeration and seeding happens here at least three times a year.
When you don’t use chemical weed control, aeration and seeding is crucial to encourage grass thick and healthy enough to crowd out weeds.
The special attention has worked, improving the community’s turf quality without the use of many chemicals.
Plants for Pollinators
A long walking path around the association’s man-made lake is a popular scenic stroll for residents, but helps pollinators, too. It’s planted with ornamental grasses and plants like milkweed that pollinators love. Level Green crews hand pull weeds to keep the path tidy for people and safe for wildlife.
The lesson here: sustainability is possible even on the largest properties.
4. The District of Columbia Courts Complex
Inspiration: A fresh new landscaping update revives a historic property.
Where to see it: 500 Indiana Avenue NW, Washington DC.
The high-traffic District of Columbia Courts complex is in a prime sight-seeing area, attracting hordes of visitors.
The National Historic Landmark has been around a really long time, originally designed in 1820 to serve as the first City Hall.
When buildings have been around as long as the DC Courts, landscaping needs occasional updating. The historic complex got a big landscape renovation in 2020.
Overgrown evergreen hedges and ground covers were outdated, and not doing this high-traffic property any favors.
New plantings include a more modern mix of flowering shrubs, cheerful perennials and graceful ornamental grasses. The modern update is great commercial landscaping inspiration for Washington DC.
The goal is to have something blooming in every season.
Hostas, coneflower and rudbeckia add color and texture, and come back dependably year after year, a budget bonus.
Hundreds of colorful annuals were part of the revitalizing DC landscape design update, too, including bright begonias and coleus in the summer and a mix of red, white and yellow pansies in the fall, along with a multitude of autumn mums.
The lesson here: a fresh landscape update adds vitality and interest to even the most historic site.
5. The Golden Triangle
Inspiration: Stunning mass plantings with color blocking attract attention.
Where to see it: Connecticut Avenue in downtown Washington, DC.
More than 5,000 flowers, plants and stunning displays add vibrant visual appeal to the striking Connecticut Avenue medians that beautify this major DC thoroughfare, stretching six to seven blocks long.
A key element of the stunning Washington DC landscape design: color blocking. That means planting big blocks of flowers in the same type and color. Think 100 orange zinnias planted together, next to a mass of 200 chartreuse sweet potato vine and 100 purple Persian shield.
These visually striking blocks of color grab attention, even if you’re just driving past.
The lesson here: plant in colorful masses to attract attention.
6. Park Potomac
Inspiration: Creative landscape enhancements encourage fun community gathering.
Where to see it: The intersection of I-270 and Montrose Road in Potomac, Md.
This high-end, mixed-use community has become a popular destination to live, work and play. In addition to luxury high-rise condominiums and brownstone townhomes, the community also offers apartments, office buildings, a shopping center and restaurants.
Their goal: encourage a bustling, welcoming sense of community.
How do they do it? The enhancements-filled Maryland landscape design plays a huge part.
Grassy green lawns, tidy paver patios, wide beds of cheerful yellow daylilies and pretty hanging baskets of blooming pink begonias are cheerful and inviting.
A fun center court area with a tented stage, bocce court, dog park and putting green create a welcoming gathering space.
Families and groups of friends gather here for everything from painting sessions beneath the big white tent to live music and comedy to girls’ nights out as women cluster around flickering fire pits for movies, wine, and s’mores.
Adding to the festive atmosphere is an impressive fountain that adds splash and ambience in the center court area, strings of twinkling lights overhead, and huge planters brimming with beautiful blooms.
People love it.
The lesson here: use landscaping enhancements to set the stage for fun.
7. The Yards Park
Inspiration: Targeted turf care helps high-use lawns hold up to foot traffic.
Where to see it: 355 Water Street SE, Washington, DC.
Close to 100,000 people a year visit The Yards Park, a 5.5-acre public park designed to be the centerpiece of the mixed-use project known as The Yards.
That’s a lot of feet walking through this Washington DC commercial landscaping.
This modern urban park is an anchor of the redeveloped Capitol Riverfront neighborhood.
It’s a green haven of tranquility amid the urban bustle, and the healthy green lawns are a highlight, where people set up chairs or spread out picnic blankets.
Thousands of people attend weekly summer concerts and music festivals here.
Green, healthy grass with few weeds is the goal for a well-used site like Yards Park, where lots of fun happens outside.
Level Green brings a detailed turf care strategy to keep the popular park lawn healthy and thriving, with targeted visits for fertilizing and weed control throughout the year.
Crews visit twice in the spring — first in March or April to apply fertilizer, pre-emergent crabgrass killer, and post-emergent broadleaf weed killer to target weeds like dandelion and clover.
A second visit in May or June repeats the process. Crews visit a third time in July or August to spot spray only for any broadleaf weeds that have popped up. Spot spray is better for the environment, but still targets weeds.
Then, a final round of fertilizer goes down in October or November to help the expansive Yards Park turf store nutrients for the winter and emerge strong and healthy in the spring.
Beyond that, aeration and overseeding ensures the healthy roots and thick turf needed for lawns that impress.
The lesson here: a healthy green lawn is possible with expert attention, even in challenging high-use areas.
8. Franciscan Monastery
Inspiration: Create peaceful spots on your property for rest and respite.
Where to see it: 1400 Quincy St. NE, Washington DC.
It’s hard to find a more peaceful spot amid the hustle and bustle of Washington DC than the Franciscan Monastery, where expansive gardens, replicas of Holy Land shrines and the serenity of nature offer a welcome respite.
Formally named The Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America, the 42-acre site, opened in 1899, is an oasis of peace and relaxation,
featuring a fragrant formal rose garden with 3,000 rose bushes; a small forest and meadow; a greenhouse; beehives and a park with picnic tables.
It’s all great commercial landscaping inspiration for Washington DC.
Visitors can wander through the peaceful property, explore landscaped gardens, admire statuary, inhale fragrant scents and listen to the calming sound of splashing fountains.
The lesson here: everybody appreciates a slice of serenity, even if it’s a single secluded bench on your property surrounded by fragrant plants.
Need Inspiration to Boost Your Commercial Property? Trust Level Green
You don’t have to go far for great landscape inspiration.
When you drive past an impressive expanse of healthy green lawn, huge drifts of bright pink begonias or a bustling public courtyard packed with people having fun outside, make a note. How can you do that?
We’re happy to help. The Level Green Landscaping team creates and maintains memorable, much-used commercial landscapes in Washington, DC, Maryland and Northern Virginia.
Let’s create something great at your property, too.
Our in-house team of experts has made Level Green Landscaping one of the most trusted in the region.
Our service area includes Washington DC, Maryland and parts of Virginia. We focus on commercial property maintenance for offices, retail spaces, mixed-use sites, HOAs/condominiums, distribution centers, municipalities and institutions.
Contact us at 202-544-0968 or by filling out our form online. You can also schedule a free consultation to talk with us about how we can enhance and maintain your commercial landscape.
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Douglass Delano
Doug Delano (and Bill Hardy) opened Level Green Landscaping LLC in 2002 to offer Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia reliable commercial landscape maintenance services.