Garden Waterfalls

Everyone wants one, admit it. The notion of sitting back in the sun, hearing the water trickle or even roar down a falls, sipping a drink and reading a book or just being lazy and falling asleep to the soothing sound of running water appeals to us all. There is some idealized communion with nature and a fascination with water that just appeals to some native level in everyonel.

Landscapes are constructions of fantasy, pure and simple. We take a patch of Earth and transform that dirt into a finished fantastic product, a result of a collaboration. A client asks for something rather specific – the landscaper consults and, between them they design something. The talking phase consists, for me, of finding out what they want. Do they want something subtle and non-invasive? Are they aware of just how loud water is? In the end, we arrive at a concept which I then design and then install. But what are all the options?

Do they want something small and out-of-the-way like this?:

Something a bit more grand?

Or something in between, like some slow, meandering stream, perhaps??

I’ll develop more of this and the theme itself over the next few days. These are a true sort of Holy Grail for landscapers. Most I know of love making them, in spite of all the implicit trouble these dang things can be. The fact is, from landscapers to homeowners, everybody loves them. They draw the eye and the ear and they just soothe the soul like little else.

Concrete Block Walls

In literally scores of landscapes, there are grade changes, altitude adjustments owing to the intricacies of the local land. Walls, as mentioned below, are a handy remedy. In fact, sometimes there is no substitute for them. With modern property law now firmly affixed dealing with issues of drainage and controlling water on one’s own property, “neighbor lawsuits” insist that solutions be met to insure all rainwater and irrigation be conducted elsewhere. Sometimes, this can present a huge quandary. Many times the only solution may be some sort of lowering of the lawn or garden level to deal with water appropriately. These pictures in this post represent a small range of possibilities in the construction of walls made from pre-engineered modular pieces, or segmented concrete blocks.

They also look really cool. I have to also mention, they are easier, by far, to construct than those made out of rock, given the same parameters. There are dry-stacked rock walls which can be built fairly rapidly with the right machinery and with select types of rocks themselves, but these are for projects long ahead of the actual building of homes. When a home is built, suddenly it becomes more problematic fitting in machinery that can easily handle those one ton beasts. Take it from me – I have tried.

So we’re left with other solutions. I love the flexibility of these blocks, myself. Curving them makes for an arresting design, pretty to look at and functional as all heck. These stones are all pre-engineered by geotechnical experts in handling water issues of hydrostatic pressure: the buildup of pressure as water collects behind a wall. Naturally, it requires foresight enough to insert pipes and drain systems as a part of the construction. When done right, it can be quite a nice sight, as the smiling morons here can attest ;-):

The ability to insert stairs and even bench seating is another great opportunity to add visual value to a wall as well as providing access and the ability for gardeners to get to their missions.

Or, you can even put a moving water display into your wall:

All in all, the segmented wall is not hard to build. It is definitely heavy work and there is cutting involved, although not a lot. The primary consideration in wall-building, at almost every level, is to make sure the bottom course is sturdy and durable. Once that is achieved, the rest is gravy.

More Garden Walls, More Landscape Walls: Using Rocks

We get into some fairly challenging situations in landscape construction. Everyone sees and appreciates the finished products – after all, landscaping is an ultimate “eye candy”. I used to call it the “Ultimate Cosmetic”. I was probably wrong, but it still is one gargantuan cosmetic, for real. I guess those things we see from Space itself are “ultimates”, like copper mines and the Great Wall. Did I say “wall”?

Some projects offer huge dilemmas. This one pictured above for example. We were told to use only “existing rocks” for the walls. While that was fine…..I mean look at that grade and imagine any rock deliveries coming in from the other side of this house…….uphill! No thanks. So, the real problem here was this: those rocks composed a real wreck of an existing wall, and the other two thirds were cemented in place as an amazingly homely barbecue! A big one, too. Could we have done a better job?  I always thought so, to be perfectly honest. It truly bothered me that the budget did not incorporate at least a few choice rocks for anchors and for a better appearance. But we had what we had.  The truth is, the plants later cascaded over those walls and provided little more than “peeks” at the construction itself.  This was also by design, but the “purist” in me was never truly happy with that set up, to be candid.

The truth is, we used every last rock on that wall. We took absolutely zero of them away. Picture us chipping away at the cement embedded on what would have been an adequate face for a wall rock and you have a reasonable picture of what was involved. And “face” matters. You want a face to be backwards sloped (its “batter”) at about 2-5% and nothing looks worse than a wall with a bunch of protrusions in weird spots.

This next one was taken during construction of a “garden grotto”, also using “found rocks” we dug up and encountered on site. It is in Reno, Nevada, a great source for rocks, beyond doubt. But it’s not like one was hand-picking selections for delivery. It became a literal “ore” as we excavated and picked and chose. Anyway, here are two views of that wall, one during construction and the other, later one, after completion, maybe the same day it was done:

Here are some other looks near by the latter two examples, one taken during construction and the final one taken from the street, looking the other way. Like I said, Nevada has them some rocks!

Spring Trees in Portland

We definitely get our share of great-looking plants up here. Naturally, we pay for that in misery, with all the rain, but there are days when it seems just so worth it all. This Spring being cooler than normal and for a longer time has meant a longer blooming period in general.  Where typically some hot streak will come by and burn up blooms, this season it has been much more benevolent. Once again I mine my own neighborhood for pretty cool shots of local trees.

Leading off we have a great-looking pink dogwood in fine flower.  Below, I had to post this.  This is a variegated-leaf dogwood, looking especially white today owing to the leaves emerging with the blooms. Pretty wild-looking thing, isn’t it?

Here’s a tree native to the area, although more commonly seen near the coast.  This Madrone is one of my favorite trees.  It’s bark is typically colorfully-red, peeling like White Birch almost, but with real character in terms of branching shapes and points of interest. It’s also evergreen with those gorgeous glossy leaves almost Southern Magnolia-like.

Finally, I am gratuitously including this medium sized Japanese Maple just because I adore them.  It’s so nice to see them back and thriving.  I have always been so partial to this purple leaf variety, too.  This one has exceptionally great shape in this very inconspicuous spot too.

And it is still Spring!  Lordy.  The weather went from the 50’s all the way to the mid 90’s, now back into the 50’s.  Oh, and it;s raining.  It’s like we never left November!