Choose Best Landscape Fabric for Your Project

Whether you’re building a backyard garden, laying gravel for a driveway, or creating drainage under a parking lot, landscape fabric is an important material that serves to stabilize the soil, lessen weeds, and prolong the site’s life. As a function barrier between soil layers for sites above, it plays a key role in residential and commercial landscapes.

Properly applied, the best landscape fabric can prevent the viability of weeds without herbicides, assist drainage, prevent erosion, and save time and maintenance of the site. However, not all fabric is equal. The right fabric depends on your unique situation, soil type, climate, moisture levels, and area of use.

At Comsyn, we manufacture quality, woven, and non-woven geotextiles for landscape, agriculture, and construction. We know landscape fabrics, and we can provide you with a high-performance fabric landscape solution that matches your project needs!

What Is Landscape Fabric?

Landscape fabric is made from a synthetic or natural material (usually polypropylene or polyester) designed to enhance the performance of soil in landscaping and construction. When you lay landscape fabric beneath mulch, gravel, or soil, you create a semi-permeable layer that allows air and water to permeate to plant roots while preventing weed growth.

So, what is landscape fabric used for? Some of the primary uses for landscape fabric are:

To suppress weeds by limiting the sunlight from reaching the underlying seeds.
To stabilize soil in areas prone to erosion or unanticipated slopes.
To pull water through the fabric and allow drainage (especially where gravel or stone is placed on top.
To strategically separate soil layers to maintain structure and performance.

Whether you’re using it at home in the backyard or on a commercial site, landscape fabric is important for maintaining structure and environmental function.

Types of Landscape Fabric

Familiarizing yourself with the different types of landscape fabric available enables you to make an appropriate choice for your project objectives. The two primary types are woven and non-woven landscape fabrics.

Woven Landscape Fabric

Woven landscape fabric is made by tightly weaving synthetic fibers to form a mesh. Woven landscape fabric is very durable, and it works well for weed control, as water and nutrients can get through. Woven landscape fabric is great for long-lasting landscaping projects like:

Garden beds
Walkways
Under mulch or gravel
Sloped areas requiring erosion control

Woven fabric is typically regarded to be the best landscape fabric for outdoor, heavily used applications due to its durability and strength.

Non-Woven Landscape Fabric

Non-woven landscape fabric is manufactured from bonded or felted synthetic fiber, and is better utilized for its filtration and drainage properties if the intended application has a water management component:

French drains
Retaining wall backfill
Under stones in driveways or parking areas

While not as substantial as woven textiles, non-woven types are perfect for enhancing sub-surface water flow and protecting soil from clogging. If you’re looking for landscape fabric for wet conditions, non-woven is the proper selection.

Where and When to Use Landscape Fabric?

Picking the right use case assures the best results. Here are the most common situations in which landscape fabric is both effective and necessary:

Parking Lots & Driveways: Stops gravel from mixing with soil and keeps weeds from growing underneath.
French Drains: Improves drainage and filters soil, preventing it from clogging.
Garden Beds & Walkways: Keeps weeds down while allowing nutrients & moisture to reach plants.
Retaining Walls & Slopes: Keep soils separate and help with erosion.
Bars, Stables, & Animal Zones: Stabilizes the ground and helps with mud buildup.
Greenhouses & Nurseries: Keeps grow areas clean and free of weeds.

Knowing you can successfully use landscape fabric in these applications means less fuss long term and improves maintenance.

Benefits of Using Landscape Fabric

Using fabric landscape products offers several real-world and environmental benefits:

Chemical Free Weed Control: Landscape fabric prevents sunlight and weeds from germinating naturally.
Erosion Control: Landscape fabric will hold topsoil in place when used on a slope or disturbed ground.
Improved Drainage: Water can drain freely through landscape fabric without soil, especially with non-woven fabrics.
Stable Surfaces: Gravel paths, driveways, and roads will remain intact when installed with landscape fabric.
Reduced Cost of Maintenance: Maintenance will be much less because weed growth can be minimized, and drainage is improved.

Landscape fabric, when properly selected and installed, may improve the performance and longevity of your entire project.

Factors to Consider When Choosing Landscape Fabric

To choose the right landscape fabric for your project, think about the following considerations:

1. Project type and location

A driveway located in a rainy part of the country will have different fabric requirements than a garden in the backyard. If it is a site that will see a ton of foot traffic, then it might require a strong woven fabric, while gardens may prefer to be built upon breathable fabrics.

2. Drainage Needs

If you need to manage water flow, for example, in a French drain or underneath a retaining wall, then you want the non-woven landscape fabrics that are designed for drainage and filtration.

3. Tensile strength and durability

When choosing a weight of fabric, be sure to choose some with the right tensile strength for the job. In general, woven fabrics tend to be better for longevity and support of load-bearing areas.

4. UV resistant and longevity

UV-protected and stabilized fabrics will last longer when exposed to sunlight. If you are placing materials unmulched, or are using a temporary installation, the sun will degrade all landscape materials in the end.

5. Soil and climate-specific conditions

If you have loose soils or sandy soils, you may need to look for a thicker fabric to ensure they stay in place. If you have high-clay-based soils, breathable membranes will ensure moisture regulation through the soil, increase in fertility.

6. Compatibility with planned mulch or gravel surface

Make sure that the material you have chosen for your site will perform well underneath whatever you place on top of it. Some fabrics will hold their placement better once mulch or gravel is placed; however, some fabrics will allow tons of movement and shifting.

Evaluating these factors ensures that you not only pick the right material but also maximize the return on investment for your landscaping effort.

Why Choose Comsyn for Landscape Fabric?

At Comsyn, we offer a large selection of woven and non-woven landscape fabrics designed to meet the real-world challenges of construction, landscaping, and environmental management.

Complete Product Range: We provide products for both residential and commercial purposes, weighing products from light category weed barriers to heavy-duty geotextiles.
Tested Filtration & Strength: Our products are designed to perform while balancing permeability, durability, and tensile strength.
Eco-Good Practices: We practice sustainable sourcing and demonstrate how our products facilitate the installation of low-impact, compliant products.
Custom Options: Do you need a specific roll size, weight of fabric, or permeability level? We provide what you need according to your project requirements and environmental conditions.

We encourage happy customers to think of Comsyn as not just buying a product, but rather a partnership with a company that can help you use landscape fabric successfully, long into the future.

Conclusion

So, are you now wondering what landscape fabric is? Please don’t take away from this article that landscape fabric is simply a weed barrier, while that is a part of it, it is much more a part of site prep, erosion control, and water management. When considering the use of landscape fabric, regardless of whether it’s for a garden, greenhouse, parking lot, or slope, ultimately, the best choice of landscape fabric can affect the project efficiency, aesthetics, and lifespan.

In the end, you can’t go wrong with who you choose to supply your landscape fabric – keep it simple and go with a reputable supplier. Comsyn provides the technical knowledge, married with practical performance, to help enlighten you.

Be sure to check out what Comsyn has to offer in landscape fabric products – designed for strength and sustainability, and engineered for success.

FAQs:

What’s the difference between landscape fabric and filter fabric?

Landscape fabric is used mainly for weed control and soil stabilization, whereas filter fabric is used mainly for drainage and filtration in areas where water is flowing freely.

Can I use landscape fabric under gravel or stone?

Yes, landscape fabric should perform well under gravel or stone by preventing the growth of weeds and creating stability for anything on the surface.

How long does landscape fabric typically last?

The best qualities of fabric landscape materials can last anywhere from 5–15 years, depending on exposure to UV light, soil type, and how well it was installed.

Can landscape fabric damage plant roots?

If properly used, landscape fabric should not harm anything; if it kills anything, it may be that you have restricted water and air flow over time and stressed the roots of your plant.

How to Choose the Best Landscape Fabric for Your Project?