How do you go about decorating your town?

[itsrowan]

I revisited my town in New Leaf today after three years of inactivity.

Been thinking about redecorating my town--maybe resetting it so I can have a totally clear canvas to work with, but I know that exterior decor is significantly harder to place and plan for in NL than it is in NH. I've since forgotten how to make do with what NL gives you as I'm so used to NH's mechanics. I'm aware this is very much a first-world problem, but I've been terribly spoiled with being able to freely move houses, entire trees, and even furniture outside lol

So! My question for NL players, how do you go about decorating your town despite such limitations? You can give as many or as little details as you want about your process!

 

[-Raven-]

Dang, I thought this was the NH forum and I got excited to share tips about matching items. Truth be told there are still a lot of the same fundamentals in matching stuff, but your options in NL are more limited. That’s not only exterior but in some ways, interior too due to the more restrictive grid and not as much lighting potential and blah blah…

However I can tell this thread is about the exterior, and I’m definitely not a pro at that… I will however give my tips for my current town which I’m quite pleased with the progress on!!

1. Set paths. This is mandatory as a first step. Not only that but consider what type of paths you want. Consider what width you want, and wether you want variation in width. Consider wether you want diagonal paths and how to go about them. Consider how you would align tiles with landmarks like the plaza or PWPs. For instance, as I’ve done in my town, the plaza can nicely be lead into with a 3 square wide vertical tile aligned with the 3 square wide town tree (it isn’t placed on the plaza stone in my case, but if you like, you can do that). Also, you should have an idea of where you want most villager houses to be at this stage (it doesn’t have to be all of them, but at least block in several plots with the pattern trick or start getting ideas to do so). If houses are in the way plan as if they were not there and get them to move out later. Btw this applies even if you want natural / tile-less paths, just remove the planning tiles later.
2. Once you have a good idea of the paths you want you can start to spin off this by considering what type of PWP you want, wether you have particular favorites, which type of police station and overall vibe etc. Personally I find there are certain PWPs I always want in my town because I love their design so much. In my instance, I like a lot of the more natural looking PWPs but I don’t want a completely overgrown/overly natural town. As such I came to focus on an aesthetic for my town. I plan for it to be colorful and abundant with fruit but very well-kept. Heavy focus on color gradients with flowers and how paths are framed by surrounding objects. Areas and landmarks that are somewhat tucked away, for example the campsite has its own exclusive peninsula above the river. It probably sounds pretty vanilla but I feel like I want that classic vanilla vibe and just want to do it really well.
3. Continuing on the point of PWPs look for points that can branch off to them or where they can be tucked in. PWPs have a lot of presence and instantly become an interest point. You can also think about storytelling at this point: why x thing was here, what residents do there, is it something obscured or exclusive. Etc. In my town I plan to put an instrument shelter behind the town hall which Isabelle uses and then announces the weather with (in my headcanon). The police station goes right next to town hall coz… duh. But some people might prefer it to be around their villagers if their town is more rowdy or something. Isabelle also has seats behind town hall next to the waterfall coz damn she needs a break. Sometimes you can get creative with stuff like making a stump in lieu of a table pwp. Which I did, I put a stump between two chairs. I plan to have a florist (player house) next to a cafe and both are near my entrance for tourists. This is something I had to consider when picking the map, so you would have to reset for something like this, but I also have the plaza next to the train station as another gathering or welcoming space for tourists (the plaza is a very allpurpose area in my town, and also has a lot of dropped fruit stacks- every type, including perfect fruits- to represent the town’s abundance). Continuing off this dropped items can be good storytelling.
4. How to differentiate areas with separate purposes and landmarks, it’s easy to design a park but in my town for example I have one park, and one bench which is like a mini-park is actually right above the cliff making it more of an ocean lookout. Simple but an extremely clear difference. Being willing to make your pwps distinct adds a lot. You can also do this with dropped items. For example I was thinking about dropping crystals exclusively on my secret beach, and above my dock I have a tropical fruit basket area, and another part of the beach has a fossil area. Maybe around your player house there are more pwps or maybe not if you prefer being in nature and want to reflect that. Maybe you have a richer district in your town near the beach. Tbh this is sort of a continuation of the whole storytelling point but its important enough to emphasise the idea of making new ideas. If you want repeat pwps that are really noticeable then consider using them as a motif or really differentiate the environment design around it.
5. Depth of trees, bushes and flowers, where to cut down on flowers to leave bare ground or clovers, what is visible from pathing to ensure areas feel full and you do not visibly see over gaps (feels more artificial/small/empty most of the time). When I say depth of trees/bushes/flowers, consider the height of those objects and how you can use it to create variety and “dither” them with clever spacing and restraint. In designing these I follow artistic composition rules as I understand them. When doing this step you will probably be adjusting some path placement or potentially PWP plans.
6. Consider PWP, flower, even dropped item colors (i made a rainbow out of all the fruit). You have to work with the palettes you got here but you can still make great stuff. Color its own topic, very complicated to learn but amazing potential. Too tired to write more now lol hope something helped and this wasnt complete hot air

p.s. if you want to reset for a map have a list of must-have features, and before you settle on the map measure out certain areas to ensure what you want to build most is actually possible. Think about what you would want to return to regularly. Find something you would be proud of. dont be afraid to look up info like pwp spacing or where villagers spawn because those rules can be a headache in this game.

 

[itsrowan]

Dang, I thought this was the NH forum and I got excited to share tips about matching items. Truth be told there are still a lot of the same fundamentals in matching stuff, but your options in NL are more limited. That’s not only exterior but in some ways, interior too due to the more restrictive grid and not as much lighting potential and blah blah…

However I can tell this thread is about the exterior, and I’m definitely not a pro at that… I will however give my tips for my current town which I’m quite pleased with the progress on!!

Thank you so much for such an in-depth answer!! I have nothing to add to this except that I found it incredibly insightful and helpful! Thanks again for your response!

 

[Hunter_Gr33n]

I usually take advantage of grass deterioration and use that to establish a sort of path-like entity. I might also place custom designs over it when I feel content with what I have so far (I'm currently in the middle of doing that!). I also will gratuitously use flowers around the town, often placing a ring-like cluster of them around houses. I try to keep them in tune with how the house generally looks (for example, violets around Static's house, red, pink, and black roses around Pashmina's house, etc.). I occasionally put small rows of shrubbery around various parts of the town, except around the Plaza, where there is a ring of holly shrubs (albeit with a few gaps to provide entry).