Our dream of a lush green lawn and garden like the verdant gardens at the Simpson House Inn seen here:
have been dashed by the severe drought that California has been suffering for several years now. Instead, we recently shared with you the process of turning our once green backyard into a drought tolerant "oasis" by allowing the grass to slowly turn a lovely shade of brown
and we are now the proud owner of a well-groomed patch of dirt
This brings us to the planning stage of the new drought tolerant garden. To begin, we are mapping out the area to decide which areas will be pathways and which areas will be plant areas. We find the most difficult part of this task is deciding on the "look" we want for each area. What colors do we want to use, how tall should the plants be and which plants we want in the foreground and which ones do we want to place in the background are all topics earnestly debated. We seem to be going in circles so it is back to the drawing board as we carefully re-draw our map and compare it to the dirt patch that is our current reality. We must then establish the location of the plants and lay down the drip lines of the drip system that we will be using to deliver water. Once the lines are installed it will be necessary to stabilize the dirt with a layer of decomposed granite. The pathways will be created with pavers and somewhat compacted sand and the planting areas will receive a top layer of pea gravel. We are searching for a pea gravel that doesn’t look as if it just arrived from a building site. As you can see in the photo, we have made good progress on the grading of the back garden and Martin has dug down and removed a section of soil so that we have a seating area that looks into the garden. We both agree that we would like to replace our archaic ceramic bird bath with a modest water fountain but since we want the water to be running and recycled we now have to think about getting power to that area of the yard. The planning continues.......
To view the entire collection of architctural hardware at Martin Pierce, please visit our site at www.martinpierce.com.
Designers can visit the showroom located at:
5433 W. Washington Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90016
323 939 5929