Azure Landing Zone Quick Start Guide | Free Enterprise Cloud Foundation

What is an Azure Landing Zone?

An Azure Landing Zone is a pre-configured, secure, and scalable environment that follows Microsoft's Cloud Adoption Framework best practices. Think of it as the foundation of a house – get it right, and everything built on top is solid.

🏗️ The 5 Pillars of Azure Landing Zones

1. 🏢 Management Group Hierarchy

Design management group structure
Avoid going deeper than 4 levels
Plan for future growth
Document naming conventions

2. 🔐 Identity & Access

Configure Azure AD tenant
Set up Privileged Identity Management (PIM)
Define RBAC roles (Owner, Contributor, Reader)
Implement break-glass emergency accounts
Enable MFA for all users

3. 🌐 Network Topology

Choose Hub-Spoke or Virtual WAN
Design IP address scheme (non-overlapping)
Plan for hybrid connectivity (ExpressRoute/VPN)
Configure Azure Firewall or NVA
Set up Private DNS zones

4. 🛡️ Security & Governance

Enable Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Configure Azure Policy for guardrails
Set up Azure Monitor and Log Analytics
Implement Key Vault for secrets

5. 💰 Cost Management

Set up Cost Management + Billing
Define tagging strategy
Create budgets and alerts

📅 30-Day Implementation Roadmap

Week	Focus	Tasks
Week 1	Foundation	Management groups, naming, identity setup
Week 2	Network	IP planning, hub VNet, connectivity
Week 3	Security	Policies, Defender, monitoring
Week 4	Operationalize	First workload, documentation, training

🌐 Hub-Spoke Network Design

📋 Essential Azure Policies (Day 1)

✅ Require tags on resources (CostCenter, Environment, Owner)
✅ Allowed locations (EU regions only for GDPR)
✅ Allowed VM SKUs (prevent expensive instances)
✅ Require HTTPS for storage accounts
✅ Deny public IP on VMs
✅ Require network security groups

⚠️ Common Mistakes to Avoid

❌ Don't Do This

• Deploy workloads before landing zone is ready
• Use overlapping IP address ranges
• Skip tagging strategy
• One subscription for everything
• Manual deployments without IaC

✅ Do This Instead

• Build foundation first, then workloads
• Plan IP addresses for 5+ years
• Enforce tags via policy from day 1
• Subscription per workload/environment
• Use Bicep/Terraform for everything

💻 Bicep Quick Start

Hub VNet Example

resource hubVnet 'Microsoft.Network/virtualNetworks@2023-05-01' = {
  name: 'hub-vnet'
  location: location
  properties: {
    addressSpace: {
      addressPrefixes: ['10.0.0.0/16']
    }
    subnets: [
      {
        name: 'AzureFirewallSubnet'
        properties: { addressPrefix: '10.0.1.0/26' }
      }
      {
        name: 'GatewaySubnet'
        properties: { addressPrefix: '10.0.2.0/26' }
      }
    ]
  }
}