There’s so many things you’d rather be doing on the weekend.

You are busy, but you’re tired of a grass lawn on your front yard. You are bored by grass, and spending weekends mowing? Forget it. Can you get rid of grass and still have an easy-care front yard? Yes, you can. You can achieve the Holy Grail of the practically no-maintenance garden by making the right plant choices, and planting multiples of a few plant varieties that work.

The low-maintenance garden won’t happen in an instant: It will take a couple of seasons before the garden can (mostly) take care of itself. But once that happens you can enjoy the beauty of a simple no-maintenance garden where a front lawn used to be. Here are some examples.

Hakonechloa grass, ‘All Gold’ with Brunnera Macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ and variegated euonymus make minimalist music together.

This garden of mostly Japanese forest grass is simple, elegant and almost no care. The grass spreads out forming a low mound, shading the ground, and preventing most weeds from sprouting. The yellow-green of ‘All Gold’ Japanese Forest grass (Hakonechloa) brightens the semi-shady spot here. Brunnera ‘Jack Frost’ adds some leaf variety, and euonymus and hosta fill out the minimalist planting scheme. Some weeding is inevitable while waiting for your mounds to spread out, but layers of newspapers and mulch will help keep the space weed free while the garden matures. Hakonechloa comes in  a striped form as well, (Hakonechloa ‘Aurea’ and both will grow in shade.

Can’t get much more simple than a swath of ivy, and if you look closely, vinca on the front lawn.

With all the options for low-maintenance front gardens that allow for water runoff, and add beauty and green space, there’s no need to go to this extreme when searching for an option for a no-grass front yard.

No, this is *not* a parking pad. As a garden, this is a little too minimal for most.