Rain garden design tool

Put it where the water already goes

Walk outside during the next hard rain and watch: the water tells you where the rain garden belongs. Downhill from a downspout, at least 10 feet from the foundation, never over the septic field, and not in the spot that already stands wet for days, that is a drainage problem, not a rain garden site. Size runs about a fifth to a third of the roof area draining to it. Drawing the basin on a painting of your actual yard settles the location question in a way a brochure diagram cannot.

Three zones, one basin

A rain garden plants in rings. The center holds the most water the longest, so it takes the true wet-feet plants: blue flag iris, soft rush. The sloping sides flood briefly and drain fast, perfect for joe pye weed and swamp-edge shrubs. The rim almost never floods and wants ordinary tough perennials that tie the basin into the rest of the yard. Get the rings right and the garden thrives on total neglect; ignore them and the center drowns while the rim wilts.

And on ground with any fall, the showpiece version is a chain: two or three cells stepping downhill, each held by a low grassy berm, linked by short stone runs, exactly what the paintings on this page show. Each cell stays an honest size while the chain swallows twice the storm.

It drains in a day, and that is the point

A properly built rain garden empties within 24 to 48 hours, faster than mosquitoes can breed, which answers the first question every neighbor asks. The engine is the plants: native roots reach 6 to 10 feet down and keep drilling the soil open year after year, so the basin drains better at year five than the day you dug it. Give the overflow somewhere to go, a notch at the low edge aimed at the lawn, and the design handles the storm that exceeds it.

Before and after, honestly

Every Painted Acre plan starts from a photo of a real yard and ends with the same view, years grown. No invented dream yard, no stock photos.

Your yard is a plan, not a weekend

Real projects happen across years: maybe you raise privacy mounds and plant the slow shade trees first, and the water waits for year three. In Painted Acre, every plant and structure carries its own year, the studio builds the scene in phases, and the timelapse shows the whole multi-year plan paying off before you commit to any of it. Here is this sample plan, phase by phase, every frame real product output:

Year 1

Dig once, build the chain

Two dished cells step down toward the creek, bermed on the low side, boulders set into the rims, the dry creek feeding the upper cell through a stone apron. Iris and rushes go straight into the wet centers, the little birch at the overflow.

Year 2

Finish the rings

No digging this year. Joe pye weed and the buttonbush take the back slopes, the susan drifts close along the rims, and the planting is complete.

Year 3

Roots go to work

Native roots reach feet down and keep drilling the soil open. The cells now drain faster than the day they were dug.

Year 5

The rings knit

Mauve domes over the back slopes, gold along the rims, and the chain reads as a garden that happens to swallow storms.

Year 20

The overflow tree owns the corner

The river birch planted below the lower cell is now the biggest thing between the garden and the creek, drinking everything the chain sheds.

Change any year in the studio and the whole timeline repaints. Budgets like phases too: the printable report groups the shopping list by year.

The rings, painted

Wet center, brief-flood slopes, dry rim: every plant here is picked for one of the three rings and painted at every age. Enter your ZIP and the palette keeps only natives that survive your winters.

Blue Flag Iris

Iris versicolor

The wet center showpiece: violet flags in June, roots that drink like a pump.

Zones 3–93 ft

Soft Rush

Juncus effusus

Vertical structure in the deepest zone, green through winter.

Zones 4–93.5 ft

Joe Pye Weed

Eutrochium purpureum

The side-slope tower: mauve umbrellas that butterflies mob in late summer.

Zones 4–96 ft

Buttonbush

Cephalanthus occidentalis

A shrub for the wet end of bigger basins; pollinators treat the globes like a truck stop.

Zones 5–108 ft

Black-Eyed Susan

Rudbeckia fulgida

The dry rim workhorse that ties the basin into the yard.

Zones 3–92.5 ft

River Birch

Betula nigra

Plant it just downslope of the overflow and it drinks what the basin sheds.

Zones 4–940 ft

Questions people ask

What this is, and is not: Painted Acre produces an illustrative watercolor design plan: placement, plant choices, and an honest picture of growth over time. It is not an architectural, engineering, or construction document. For anything that involves excavation, water, structures, or grading, bring the plan to a qualified contractor or landscape professional and verify measurements, utilities, and local codes first.