I probably made a thread like this before, but whatever. I'm someone who struggles to make anything look good, from my town to my character, and I have almost no clue where to put stuff. I do know what PWP's and villagers I want, I just don't know where or how to plan them. I'm still deciding on if I want paths or not, but it's just almost impossible for me.
I usually like to start by looking through websites like tumblr to find ideas for my town. Even if I already have an idea of what I want, looking at other towns can help you decide where to put them/how to organize them. You can also start looking for QRs that you might like, and if you find some you like, then scan them in and see how they look in your town.
It may seem silly, but you can get a screenshot of your town map (you can upload one to miiverse or tell Isabelle you want to demolish a PWP and it'll show your map on the top) and put it into a program like Paint or something and draw out little lines for paths, bushes, trees, flowers, whatever. It can give you some ideas. Then you can go into your town and start laying down patterns for paths and placeholders for your greenery. Once you have the stuff you want/need, you'll really be able to actually see everything, and if you don't like it you can also take stuff down and reorganize. The beauty of this is that you won't actually need to have everything planned out right away-- you can work on little chunks here and there as you figure out what looks good and what doesn't.
I kind of just let it happen - I didn't have anything planned out at the beginning, I just experimented with success and failure.
I think it's mostly trial and error, so don't get discouraged; things will come together.
It's about journey and not the destination in the world of Animal Crossing
If you don't know where to start, visiting similar-themed dream towns for inspiration is really helpful! Once I built my permanent projects (Caf?, Police Station, Campsite), I worked around them and things started taking off from there. But don't rush into that - choose their locations wisely. I wish you luck in your designing!
I usually just start planning my town as I go along. I plant a couple trees here and there, decide where my public work projects are going to be and go from there. For me, planning in advance doesn't work too well for me and I become obsessed with perfection, if I do it that way.
I usually have a loose idea of what I want to do with my town based on the town name. Then I work on unlocking PWPs, usually nothing in particular; I just like having options. And as others have said, search around Tumblr and the interwebs for possible path choices.
I've never been able to search dream addresses and images for inspiration, though. I would always get discouraged looking at the towns of others and wondering why I can never make my towns look that good. I learned long ago that it's best to just do what I want for my towns, regardless of whether or not anyone else likes it.
And as others have said, it's really a process of trial and error. But most importantly, have fun! That's what this game is for, after all. ^_^
