Lucky you! What an opportunity to design something spectacular! Some basic questions: (1) is this a shaded area or sunny; (2) what type of soil is it--sandy loam, clay, acid/not acid; (3) does it get sufficient water to hydrate the plants; (4) will plants have mulch that helps them get established & fight off invasive species.

Depending on conditions, a few things that come to my mind right off the bat that I have growing where I am are creeping myrtle, the ephemeral Mertensia virginica/Virginia bluebells, astilbe/false spirea, Cranesbill/perennial geranium, Hellebore/Lenten rose, Aquilegia/columbine, Gentiana andrewsii/bottle
gentian, Alchemilla mollis/lady's mantle, Polygonatum odoratum 'Variegatum'/variegated false Solomon's seal, Heuchera/coral bells, Pulmonaria/lungwort, Taller than these is Tricyrtis hirta/toad lily that blooms in October where I am.

In among the above perennials I also grow Chelone lyonii/turtlehead, Persicaria virginiana/Virginia knotweed and assorted ferns.

If you've a spot to plant, there's generally something that will happily grow in it.

It has to be considered shaded, although I can see if I could do any limbing up to open up a little more light. The problem is really the pachysandra. It is my go-to groundcover because it is so reliably maintenance free and always look good but here is an example of its downside. Once it's established it's difficult to combine with anything else. The exposed areas you see in the picture are where I tore it out. When I go out to look at it in the morning, it may have sprung back from buried roots! The problem with letting it be the groundcover is that it hides the steps. I'd also like to make this area visible from a distance as that's the only way one would notice its existence. Maybe that problem is better solved by making the entrance or perimeter more eye-catching. I will take more pictures from other vantage points.

My soil is acid loam and moist enough in this area. Thanks for your ideas, and I welcome more, especially about how to use any of them with the pachysandra..

I would work on getting rid of the pachysandra in that area before trying to plant something else since anything that will stand up to such well-established pachysandra will also be vigorous enough to grow out over the steps. There really isn't a short cut on this IME. Or you can just plan to cut back the pachysandra regularly - a buried edging a foot or so back from the steps would help restrain the roots to keep them from growing too close to the edge of the steps, and not plant anything else.

Depending on your philosophy for your garden, you could continue to hand pull and/or mow the Pachysandra since over time it will eventually run out of energy if it can't grow leaves. This will take a while. You could smother it in a coat of a couple layers of cardboard and a deep layer of mulch, left in place for a year, and pull any sprouts that make it up through. A contact herbicide such as Glyphosate would kill the Pachysandra in areas where you don't want it, and a root barrier will keep it from spreading beyond where you do want it.

Once you have decided on how you will handle this, then you can look at what plants will be appropriate to the area. One I really like is a small Solomon's seal, Polygonatum humile.

I think I'd like to try the barrier a foot back approach, but are you suggesting I leave the steps and border bare dirt? I don't want to have to weed.

I just reread more carefully, and I think you are suggesting that the small solomon seal could be used around the steps? If it's variegated, I think that could be the answer! Or variegated hosta?

moss, berkley sedge.

Interesting! I had to look up berkley sedge.

Some type of sedge. One could have fun with the different colors of different sedges and same with the mosses. It screams for moss around the rocks. I live in Texas and I miss moss. We do get it on wet years but it is not a controllable thing because it just dissapears in the heat and lack of water. I have fond memories of it from my time up north.. Wintergreen was also a native ground cover that I remember in the woods. Maybe to ubiquitous for you.

wintergreen as in creeping euonymus? Yes, I'm pulling it out everywhere! But moss.. I need to find a source on a similar substrate and conditions, but worth trying.. Is the hosta idea too artificial looking? I mentioned it because I have it and know it would work, just like pachysandra..

Like I said, I am a texan and I never actually gardened up north so I don't know the habits and dangers of certain plants up there. I walked around and browsed off the greenery mostly, and photographed it.

I haven't found pachysandra that difficult to control. Two or three pullings and it is almost gone.

To me that doesn't look like a set of steps so much as an easily traversable rock pile. The kid's short cut, while the adult route is longer and easier. The difference is that it has to be turned into 'steps' by the presentation, and there isn't any space to work with on the sides. If you look at photos of such things, usually they are very wide steps, with plants overhanging at least 6 inches on each side to soften the edge. You don't have that six inches, so any plant has to be small, and grow pretty much straight up. There are geraniums that would work, though they would have to be maintained. Pretty much anything else is going to overhang the steps too much. This matters less if there is an alternate route.

If you want to 'light up' the area, consider planting 'Jack Frost' brunnera. It is visible from quite a distance away! It does seed if it's not deadheaded promptly. I keep the most silver of the seedlings and weed out most of the rest of them. El Niño hosta is a nice one that draws your eyes to it and goes well with the silver brunnera.

i agree with the root barrier to keep the pachysandra back from the steps.

I guess that makes me a kid at heart except the heart is 62 yrs. old. I jump all over lots of tiny rocks and under tree limbs and call them pathways. LOL That looks like a highway to me. But good suggestions. I would back off the sedge above and let i trail down .

OK, here is a plant if I lived where you do , that I would be tempted to try in some dry shade, one of the many epimediums. They have foliage interest and flowers and would look great on a slope. Beyond that, I know nothing about them except that they click my buttons.

Scroll down : epimediums

Pachysandra is easy to pull until it gets embedded and then it's tenacious and deep. But I supposed once it's been removed deep down from an area, and regularly pulled thereafter, it is doable. The point is take about having a sufficient margin so that whatever is planted does not encroach on the steps, but just comes to their edge. It is not a rock pile! These are broad, heavy and flat, and staggered for easy stepping. There is alternate access to the top and bottom terrace, but not the middle. I do need to think about creating a reason to go there...

When I started gardening here in 2000, the south side of the backyard was covered in pachysandra! Ripping it out was priority number 1! Once it was gone, I kept watch for new shoots for the next two years. After that it never reappeared.... Just after I started pulling it, we were talking to a neighbour who was complaining about the high cost of buying it for a large area she wanted to plant it in. Perfect timing... I got rid of the stuff I yanked and she got free plants :-)

Golden hakone grass would be pretty there. I grow mine in sun and shade and it always looks good. I have a 3' wide mother plant that I just dig a chunk out of when needed so it's throughout my garden.

I was thinking that one of the short ajugas and lamiums would look good right around the rocks. Some people complain about the aggressiveness of ajuga but I have no problems with it in my area. A low beauty I used to use was Lysimachia nummulariua "aurea", Golden Creeping Jenny. Again , research how it behaves in your area. It was restricted by moisture in my area. It would only grow by the hose bib here. I have heard people scream about the green creeping Jenny. I think the golden is better much behaved., but it would light up the shade and contrast nicely with the rocks and and any dark colored greens. Some one chime in if I am wrong for places east of me.

In our more moist climate I wouldn't try either the Lysimachia nummulariua "aurea" (Golden Creeping Jenny) or any but clumping forms of Ajuga. Both can spread quite a bit, so would need a fair amount of time to keep in control, unlike in .

I imagine that when Wantanamara suuggested wintergreen, she meant Gaultheria procumbens, a native groundcover that's a source of the flavor wintergreen. It would be fine there, but couldn't outcompete with Pachysandra, so would need separation. She also suggested Epimediums. I think clumping ones would be nice there, especially since the raised plants would show the early spring flowers particularly well. There was a thread on them earlier this season.

I like Mayflower's suggestion of hakone grass, either the white variegated or the gold as it would light up the area, but only spreads slowly. The Polygonatum humile I've seen is solid dark green, so though the leaves would contrast with texture, and would be a bit darker than Pachysandra, I don't think it would provide the contrast that the Hakonechloa macra All Gold would. I don't know if there are variegated forms of P. humile.

I'll ditto NHBabs re the Lysimachia nummulariua "aurea" (Golden Creeping Jenny) or any but clumping forms of Ajuga. In my slightly acidic sandy loam here in southern New England, both are aggressive/invasive. A more positive ditto is the variegated hakone grass. At present I have two that have been in the ground in part shade a couple of seasons. I enjoy the textural contrasts they offer and appreciate their zero-maintenance requirements.

I have the variegated gold and green hakone. I love variegated Solomon seal but I wouldn't say it lights up shady areas.

Himalayan maidenhair fern is a great, low spreader. The new growth stays bright green well into summer. It's semi-evergreen here in the PNW.