5 Great Brick Paver Driveway Ideas

The ribbon of concrete or asphalt that leads up to your house has a purpose, but very rarely gets to be pretty while doing it.

But the sheer size of a front driveway makes it a big player in your home’s curb appeal, which in turn is a driving force in its market value. More than 75 percent of real estate agents point to curb appeal as the number one thing you can use to boost the home’s overall appeal.

One way to make the driveway more attractive is with a paver installation. Brick pavers offer tons of options for designing an eye-catching space you might not want to hide under a car!

Because a brick paver driveway can last as long a long time with proper upkeep, you’ll want to get the project right from design to installation. Let’s look at a few great driveway ideas you can use for inspiration.

1. Get Edgy

If you want to make a small splash rather than doing a full-out cannonball, consider adding contrast to the driveway with a decorative brick border. These pavers could be added onto a current concrete driveway or be a variation on the paver you use for the main driveway.

For a straight driveway, the border could be used to give the illusion of a curved driveway, allowing you to hop on a current trend. The overall line of the driveway remains straight while the pavers curve in and out from the edge to create the illusion of motion.

2. Mix The Sizes

Even a small driveway is going to cover several hundred square feet of space, so you have a lot of room to cover. This allows you to add variety and dimension subtly by mixing up the sizes of the pavers in patterns or more randomly.

Many pavers come in three different sizes for each style — a square, a wide rectangle, and a narrow rectangle. This allows for a lot of different layouts like a T pattern or a running bond where the seams are staggered. With just two different sizes, it’s great to lay the pavers in lines but switch back and forth between the sizes.

There are limits to the sizes of brick driveway pavers. Larger slabs of 12” squares or larger need to be kept away from the expected wheel tracks, as they will be less stable under the tires than several small ones will be. That said, those large format pavers have their place and look great mixed in with smaller sizes of stone.

3. Go Color Crazy

Because we are talking about brick pavers, most of our color choices tend to fall in the natural colors you would expect to see with brick, like reds, browns, grays, tans, and yellow-beige.

That doesn’t mean that all the pavers are a single solid shade. You’ll find some that are blended where other colors get mixed in. This might be a red mottled with gray spots or a beige with darker areas of brown.

Picking a blended brick is one way to add some color variation, although the most subtle. A more interesting option is picking two or more colors and just randomly mixing them throughout the installation. You could keep it mellow by going with two shades of brown or be bold with a red, dark gray, and light gray mix.

Unless you have a good color sense, you might want to see your particular mix installed in another location before you commit. What looks good with just a couple of pavers takes on a different look once there are hundreds of them thrown together over a large space.

4. Swap Styles

Pavers come in so many options beyond a square cobblestone or rectangular red brick. That’s great if you have a house with minimal modern architecture that would look a little funny with a cobblestone driveway leading up to it.

Still, there’s much to be said for tossing in something unexpected to mix up the look of the driveway. You can have a sleek, smooth paver for most of it that match the house, then add a border of something more textured to spice it up a bit.

This is especially true as pavers continue to evolve to add more choices, particularly with face textures. You can find natural stone textures that offer a more rustic or traditional look and mix them in with smoother-faced pavers that have gained favor in recent years.

5. Develop a Pattern

Rarely are pavers installed in straight rows and columns. Simple patterns typically add interest even when all the pavers are the same size and color like herringbone and basketweave designs.

But with the variety of colors, sizes, and styles, you can get creative with the final look to add a letter or image into the driveway! Think drama and fun in a pattern that uses sweeping curves or angular geometrics. A wave-like pattern would be an appropriate addition for any Florida home, for example.

Installing something along these lines requires careful planning to ensure the design fits the space and the colors enhance rather than muddy it. Inspiration here can be found in the variety of Portuguese pavement found all over Lisbon where light and dark pavers are laid to create simple and detailed images.

Get Creative With Brick Pavers

Your driveway can take up a significant portion of your front landscape — being at best boring and at worst an eyesore. With brick pavers, however, you can see that big flat space as an opportunity to add extra curb appeal or tie the yard in with the house’s architectural style.

Different shapes, sizes, and colors allow you to mix and match to create a driveway design that’s the envy of the neighborhood.

Tired of your boring concrete driveway? Contact us to start designing your dream paver driveway today.

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