Before and After - Sustainable Summer Yard

I wanted to do a post about a project that I have been working on with an incredible family in Maplewood, NJ. They wanted to redo their entire yard to make it something special.  We worked together for about a month to get the design just right. The project is amazingly sustainable with measures ranging from self-watering planters to no mow grass and beyond.

The complete project includes new dry stack stonewalls, a 40 ft long stone planter, new front lawn, five big cedar planters, a rain garden in the backyard, a trellis and a palate of native flowers & plants.  We also used reclaimed brick for the front walkway.  

This is the BEFORE picture of the front yard.

And this is the AFTER picture.  

I made a graphic to highlight some of the local materials we used for the installation.

The grass we planted the front yard is a fescue blend that uses about 70% less water than standard lawns.  It can also be managed to eliminate the need to mow it.  This is a big savings for them in a bunch of ways.  It saves at the water meter and their pocketbook.

The entire native plant palate includes 15 different flowers, grasses, trees and shrubs.  The image below show eight of them (from top to bottom & left to right): Cardinal Flower, Blue Cardinal Flower, Rose Mallow, Blazing Star, Heart-Leaved Aster, Carex Eburnea, Jacobs Ladder and Blackhaw Viburnum.  We also planted red milkweed to create habitat for Monarch Butterflies.  

The plants are still small (as you can see in the AFTER pic), but will grow throughout the season and spread as time goes by to create a really beautiful front bed.