Before its remodel the principal quality of the Oakland, California, garden was a grey concrete wall using a weedy hillside over it, and a small yard area where no grass would grow. The lackluster perspective was all that could be viewed in the living room windows.
The clients hadn’t any interest in gardening, says landscape architect Ive Haugeland of Shades of Green Landscape Architecture, but they needed a modern low-maintenance outdoor space the whole family might enjoy.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
A bold splash of red, a play area and climbing wall, low-maintenance bamboo and grasses, a rock garden and a fountain fit the bill. An existing deck over provides shade.
Red stucco currently covers the grey concrete walls, plus a new increased planter conceals the staircase to a play area on the upper patio. A gas fire pit full of red glass keeps things toasty on cold nights.
Black bamboo in planters adds softness and rustles in the breeze, along with also the concrete keeps runners from spreading.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
The new built-in chairs are made from wood salvaged from a local bridge. After the fire pit isn’t in use, a pay transforms it into a table and extra seating.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
The fountain provides the tranquil sounds of water. Iridescent glass tiles reflect the light and create a focal point that breaks up the expanse of this red wall.
“We tried to create all the elements as multipurpose as possible; the edge of the fountain also serves as seating,” Haugeland states.
In the back you can see the handrail on the stairway that contributes to the top patio.
Steel cable railings give the top play area a modern look. “We used the lightest material feasible for the railings to keep things light and open,” Haugeland states.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
“I scale myself and put up the holds to be quite kid easy,” Haugeland notes. “They are quite simple to move around if they want to alter them up.”
The floor here is made from recycled rubber tires. Its depth and also the rubber feet under each tile create a soft landing.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
The design (click it to expand) exemplifies the awkward space the designers had to work with; the red signifies the reddish stucco-covered concrete walls.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
A bamboo slatted wall covers the existing redwood retaining wall and weedy hillside, adding powerful modern horizontal lines across the edge of their yard. Striped paving is alternately bluestone and precast white concrete.
Colors Of Green Landscape Architecture
Deer grass punctuates a narrow place between the walls and the slatted fence with spiky life. A bamboo and stone garden in a different narrow place is roughly as low maintenance as you can get.