"A Garden in the Works"

ESPatch Jul 30, 2008 0 comments

This was a quick design I did a few months back for a friend’s backyard, also on
the East Side of Austin. I thought I would share it. The idea here was to create an environment that once established will, for the most part, take care of itself.

Early concept sketches defining the main hardscaping features & elements

planning gate position and access around the yard

settling into a more refined concept, utilities and plants are integrated into the plan.
I then worked into some of the main features a little more…

From a Shed…

to a jungle temple, surrounded by large ornamental grasses. The bamboo will have the lower shoots removed to highlight the green culms against the white shed. The bamboo softens the edges of the shed, and blue river rocks suggest water at the base.

A seasonal herb tank will be the future star of a
circular courtyard.

More refined sketch, isolating some of the main features.

Here are the final images. I took photographs of views that visually “describe” the yard layout. I then worked up photoshop images based on the design and plantings defined in the earlier plan. I pulled plant images from my own yard, and found the rest online to create the following after shots.

looking back to the rear door              same image with photoshopped design. Recognize that gate? she has one too! The gate is set at an angle to the house and represents the end of the side yard. The gate is flanked by two bamboos which help soften the edges of the gate and house. The gate leads into a circular courtyard area.

before shot                                                    same shot photoshoped. The circular courtyard has a 900 gallon herb container as a center piece. The area adjacent to the house has a mass planting of Dwarf Miscanthus with a line of Giant Timber Bamboos behind to create some evergreen, light privacy. ( a request for the scheme)

Before shot. These trees will go. There  is the gate against the tree. Pathway from the back door to the gate with low maintenance planting. The fence on the left is hidden with a line of Loquats to create a tropical feel. All of the grass in the yard is removed in the new plan.

All these scrappy trees down the property line need to go, replaced with Timber Bamboo. The sunken area to the right of the shed is to be the future home of a carport. This was screened with a horizontal line of Loquats so that from the house this area would not be visible. Curved seating was introduced to the courtyard area to fit with the circular courtyard theme.

Photo-shop is a good tool to visually communicate how a yard will
look at different stages of its development. The images here visualize a future planting scheme at around the 4 year mark.

Other Notables I noted on notepaper:

This emerging Agave “needle” reminds me of the scary chaps wrist weapon on the movie “Signs”.

“That Austin garden blogger was right about these “Iced Turbans” they really do keep you cool in a heatwave, as well as not allowing aliens to read your mind”!

look how big the culm that jumped ship is now!        “she is approaching the culm!”

Gazing ball and Gopher plant.

Aloe and Azure       “Reflections, all those reflections, reflections within reflections etc,etc.zzzzz”

Looking into your Purple Heart

Can someone tell me if this is dwarf campanula, or something else?

Sad peppers wilting in the heat.                              “look over there dad, he hasn’t watered today”!
“Son, I hope this will never happen to you.”

A gnarled old planter is now a sculptural feature in one of my beds.

Firecracker Plant, Cigar Plant
Latin: Cuphea ignea
The plant gets its common names from the reddish-orange flowers which are cigar shaped and about and inch and a half long.The tubular red flowers of this summertime bloomer make it an attractive plant for hummingbirds and butterflies.

And to finish, a couple of dragons!

Stay Tuned for:

“A Beer in Time Saves Nine”

All material © 2009 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

"A Breath of Fresh Air"

ESPatch Jul 27, 2008 0 comments

I am hurting today.

I admit I am clinically diagnosed with a “must finish the project today” disorder, which for me, inevitably translates into…”must have a box of advil” later the same night syndrome. What can you do?

We are all wired differently, my impatience just seems to have more of a propensity to hurt muscles more than other more leisurely approaches to work .

I have shoveled so much decomposed granite into my backyard over the past years, that I now have a strange sense of deja vu every time I start hacking on the north face of a new delivery. My wheelbarrow (an old friend that I used to tease before it gave me a bloody shin) now lets out a disgruntled, audible “sigh” (language sensored for the purpose of this family blog) as soon as it hears the “Custom Stone” delivery truck pull up to my house. It is like it recognizes the sound of the bobcat engine, and immediately deflates it’s only tire in stubborn defiance!

Interestingly, I inevitably seem to get into these mad, shoveling endeavors in the heart of the Texas / Mars summer – but do I care, not at all.
Some things just can’t wait. I know, I know, you are saying “but he would be able to see the backbone and form of his yard better in the winter months when the structure of a garden can be better appreciated, blah blah”, I totally agree, but if I waited till then, I would have lost the creative spark and the immediate energy to scale Kilimanjaro’s north face…and both of these sensibilities for me are fleeting at best. I need to take advantage of both of them as, and when they arise…so I do, now where is that iced turban? (see earlier post for the definition of an iced turban)

This area needed refinement and structure

This bed is in the way of the new pathway, it has to go. – I was never very fond of it anyway, always an awkward spot to walk around. I pulled up the over used Home Depot rocks and created a new wider path…“Gentlemen, we can rebuild the pathways. We have the technology. We can build it better than it was before, better, wider, curvier”.

I caught Steve early this morning running laps around the new paths.

Here it is with the figure eight bed removed, I feel better already.

Ahh, so much better

The new pathway, even without boulders to define the edges, creates a more balanced orderly scene.

And here it is with the moss boulders in place. Here is my new central bed with a lot of space for future planting! I had to get another ton and a half of boulders in addition to the ones I got delivered!

Here is the feeder pond, complete with face-lift.

Picture taken from up in the Post Oak

Looking down on the ornamental grasses and my “octopus” windchimes.

Okay, so I am even bored at this point of looking at pathways! enough is enough! But before we leave all these pathway scenes, tell me you noticed the red-neck tape fix inside my red-neck pool…classy!

Other Oddities in the yard right now:

Is he making fun of us Charlie?

This hedgehog errr cone flower looks like it has been set on fire! I do not dead head, the birds like to munch on these.

Alice in Wonderland toadstools in my Canna container

Flowering Fennel in front of the Agave pups

Looking up through the Papyrus

Texture on a Banana leaf looks almost manufactured.

Golden Miscanthus seed head against silver Artemesia

“Hey, look over there, you get a really good view of the new pathways from up here!”

Stay Tuned for:

“A Garden in the Works”

All material © 2009 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

East Side Patch

"A Garden in the Works"

“A Beer in Time Saves Nine”

"A Breath of Fresh Air"

“A Garden in the Works”

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