process
With the excavation of the main pond area complete - that is, with all shelves cut and compacted and niches prepared for caves and hiding places - it's time to insert the underlayment and place the liner. The underlayment is something of an unsung hero in pondcrafting: It keeps sharp stones from gouging the liner as it's being set in the hole and, longer term, deflects roots that might try to penetrate the liner to get easy access to a huge source of water. Our goal is to prevent any such problems, so we
With the excavation of the main pond area complete - that is, with all shelves cut and compacted and niches prepared for caves and hiding places - it's time to insert the underlayment and place the liner. The underlayment is something of an unsung hero in pondcrafting: It keeps sharp stones from gouging the liner as it's being set in the hole and, longer term, deflects roots that might try to penetrate the liner to get easy access to a huge source of water. Our goal is to prevent any such problems, so we
I first came to St. Lucia in 1970 to work for a Canadian architectural firm based on the island. As it has turned out, I never left. The beauty of St. Lucia’s landscapes, the warmth and character of its people and the unlimited potential to create something very special here captured my imagination. It’s a Caribbean paradise one must experience personally to fully appreciate and understand. When I first encountered the property that is now home to Anse Chastanet and Jade Mountain in 1974, there was almost nothing here – a handful of small bungalows nestled in the rainforest across maybe five acres of land. Amenities included four aluminum umbrellas and four plastic lounge chairs on the sand, and there was a lady who sat at the bottom of the stairs leading to the beach. She had a cooler filled with Cokes and a bottle of local rum, enabling you to enjoy the beautiful setting and have a drink. But the occupancy rate was very low and nothing about the place beyond the setting would make
We landshapers can and should attach a dollar figure to our knowledge, experience and integrity. That's a lesson I had to learn the hard way. About fifteen years ago, I was in need of a new dump truck for my growing business. I wasn't rich, so I decided to buy a used vehicle and found one in the local truck-trader newspaper. After looking at the truck with my trusty mechanic, I made an offer to my fellow landscape contractor, and he accepted. As we entered his office to complete the necessary paperwork, I came face-to-face with a landscape plan that looked very familiar: It was one I had drawn for potential clients. In fact, it was the colored plan I had presented to them only a few weeks earlier. I felt violated: That was my plan sitting on his desk. I asked him where he'd gotten it - an obvious and unnecessary question - and he told me that
In discussing my role as a "forensic landscaper" a few months back, I expressed my disappointment in the quality of some of the work I was seeing in my local marketplace - and if the e-mail I've been receiving is any indicator, I am not alone in this experience. Indeed, questionable workmanship may be more prevalent that I ever could have imagined. As a result of this revelation, I will be using this space from time to time to demonstrate the fact that failure is often a better teacher than success and that, by exploring the nature and causes of failed projects, we can all come to a better understanding of the principles and practices that lead to good results. Before I begin, however, I'd like once again to salute
Practice makes perfect when it comes to developing the observational skills you need to support your design acumen. As I discussed last month, honing these abilities enables a designer to see individual and collective shapes within a garden setting in ways that can enhance the overall appearance of plant/hardscape combinations and turn them into cohesive and more compelling visual compositions. Among all of those artistic abilities is one specific skill that has served me best and will be my subject in this column: That is, the ability to determine the level of contrast my clients want to see in their garden spaces. As an artist, I've always been inspired by the areas in paintings that display the
It's speculated that the exterior spaces at Playboy Mansion West must be the most photographed in the world. That's hard to quantify, of course, but it's certainly safe to say that since construction began in the 1970s, the home of publisher Hugh Hefner and its famous swimming pool and grotto have been used ceaselessly to promote his unique lifestyle. Indeed, the residence has attained near-mythic status as the world's most elaborate adult playground. For about 20 years, we had
Everywhere you turn these days, you see watershapers tackling projects that would have been unthinkable even a few years ago. It wasn't that long ago that simply raising a spa seemed like a big challenge, but these days vanishing edges, perimeter overflows and other ambitious details have become relatively common. And it's not just technology: Watershapers are gravitating toward great materials, colors, hardscape, plants and amenities - signs of real growth and, for the most part, a very good thing. With this broadening list of possibilities, however, have come some growing pains. The industry's like a teenager with
