Adding Depth to Your Garden
I initially built the walls pictured below to divide my flat and featureless garden, taking the eye away from the prominent edges of our relatively small suburban lot in Leucadia. The division also helped create a distinct space on the far side of the wall. From the house it provided some screening from the expanse of dying bermuda grass, dog eared fence and busted up concrete that lay behind it. Staggering the walls and leaving gaps between them helped make them feel less monolithic and allowed for interesting shadow play. More about shadows in another post!
A few years have passed since the walls were built and I felt like they were setting the stage for something in front of them, I asked my father if he’d be interested in making a sculpture to sit where the blue pot is. Having a mature artists restraint he suggested instead of adding more to the composition (the plants are looking pretty awesome) to instead take something away by cutting windows into the walls. Brilliant! Ten minutes later we were hacking away with the diamond blade saw. I’ll be finishing the interior cuts on the to side walls with a welded steel frame similar to the one in the center when I get a little break from the run of new gardens we’re building. The windows provide tempting little views into the back garden that invite exploration and add a layer of depth and mystery to the garden.
For the plant nuts: The fine textured smaller “grass” is a drought tolerant native sedge (Carex pansa), the big grass is palm grass (Setaria palmifolia), , various bromeliads whose names I’m never sure of, a hybrid Aloe, wallflower (Erysimum ‘Jenny Brook’), lime (right), artichoke (way back), lemon grass and more…
