Kerkythea can be used by both architectural professionals and educational institutes, as users do not need to spend any money on software licensing. It was developed as a powerful plug-in for SketchUp. Kerkythea is a free, open-source rendering software that provides a full staging application for users to render architectural models and illustrations. Here is a link to a series of tutorial movies that illustrate the use of SketchUp to produce landscape models. There are tons of videos and online resources that you can use to learn and help yourself! It just takes time and practice to master the program but the models created can give a client a very good idea of what the design will look like when implemented. We suggest that you get the free version, or use a free trial and play around with it. The figure below created with the free version of SketchUp shows one of our designs It begins with a 30-day trial of SketchUp Pro. The non-expiring license costs $695, but there is a free version you can try. SketchUp Pro is the desktop version of the tool it’s more powerful, customizable, and shareable. Unfortunately, it is no longer available however SketchUp is now available as a free, web-based 3D modeling tool to help visualize your landscape design ideas. The desktop standalone free version was called SketchUp Make and was used by many designers to build 3D landscape models. There are commercial and free versions of SketchUp. SketchUp is a 3d CAD modeling software published by a company called Trimble. If you are a landscape design student at a recognized college, write to us and request an activation code for a free copy of GardenCAD. Read more about GardenCAD here.Ĭlick here to download a free booklet about using CAD for landscape design.ĭesign Cad is a group of software developers who have created a range of tools for professional landscape designers. Many professionally drawn symbols are included.ĭownload GardenCAD from this page, install, and test it out. The figure below shows a garden design plan created using GardenCAD. GardenCAD (aka Garden CAD) is a powerful, easy-to-use, entry-level landscape design software tool for landscapers. Those marked with a * have been more comprehensively tested and are recommended. Here we provide some information and feedback about those we have been able to find and briefly evaluate. From time to time, we field inquiries from designers who have a limited budget want access to free landscape design software applications.

Landscaping 3d design software free