Joanna Gaines knows how to put together a meal, a dinner party, a well-designed room, and a garden. Now add container gardens to the list.
Gaines offers a closer look at her fall container gardens in the fall 2025 issue of Magnolia Journal.
Joanna’s Method for Perfect Fall Planters
Photo by Ruthie Martin
Rather than just seeing what strikes her fancy when she’s perusing plants at the store, Gaines creates a mood board.
“Before going to the nursery, I’ll create a mood board with photos of what I’m going for, including a color palette,” Gaines says. “I’ll choose one or more colors to highlight in each planter so the grouping feels cohesive.”
We’ve heard of mood boards for designing rooms, but not for planters. If this is the trick to get fall container gardens as gorgeous as hers, we’ll be trying it.
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Putting It All Together
Once she’s got her mood board set and the color palette picked out, Gaines relies on the most widely known method for picking which kinds of plants to put together.
“I tend to stick with the classic formula: thrillers (upright focal points), fillers (for lush understory), and spillers (to trail off the pot),” she says.
The trio of planters on her front porch play with the thriller, filler, spiller method as well. Gaines chose three different heights of planters with plants that shoot up, vine over the sides, and sit all bunched together.
“When it’s time to style the plants, if you’re going for a full, lush look, plant two or three of each variety per planter—don’t be afraid to cram them in there,” Gaines says.
Photo by Ruthie Martin
During the planting, Gaines stayed attuned to the final resting place of the planters, even if that meant choosing a plant that wasn’t ideal for the setting. For her, the unideal growing conditions for a preferred plant was worth it.
“To add height and make this entrance feel complete, I added Japanese maples to our front porch. These coneflowers were too good to pass up, even though they need lots of sun and a shaded porch isn’t the best place for them,” Gaines says.
The Fall 2025 Issue of Magnolia Journal is available for purchase now at Magazines.com.