Having never owned a house or really had a yard of my own, I got pretty excited and decided to do some ad-hoc landscaping. Built some raised beds for vegetables, and just laying in some organic shaped in-ground beds for low water decorative plants. Gonna fill the rest in with gravel. Any pointers?
Yeah, that possibility had occurred to me right after posting, too. There are drought resistant grasses, but if there are already restrictions in place, it might make sense to plan ahead and simply patch the gravel with some low water plants.
IMHO, adding a few plants to the gravel really breaks up that otherwise somewhat sterile look. I'm a big fan of Japanese dry gardens which use a lot of gravel and rock, but those are meticulously planned and become sculptures more so than gardens. In residential garden planning, people often create a barren landscape by simply piling up gravel in a large area.
If you like succulents/cactii, those are always an option, but there are plenty of other plants, too. I tried to look for some examples and I think this page has a bunch of useful images on a single page:
https://www.homedesigninspired.com/32-stunning-low-water-landscaping-ideas-for-your-garden/
On related "trick": there are apps that recognize plants from a picture on your phone. I originally got one to use during hikes, but turns out they can also help when planning a garden. If you see something you like online but no mention of what it is, simply save the image, crop and run through the app. I use http://plantnet.org ,which can also be used right from the browser.