Landscaping Magic Fixes a Dangerous Sloped Yard

Landscaping Magic Fixes a Dangerous Sloped Yard

Landscape architect Michael Glassman usually has to walk a home before he starts to analyze a site’s challenges. However, when he visited Larry and Beth Goldberg’s home in Sacramento, California, he was not out of the car before the problems became evident. “I could not find somewhere to park,” he says. “The home is on an incline, and the road goes up a hill, which people race down. You take your life in your hands out of your car if you park on that street.”

Here’s how Glassman opened the landscape and made it function for the family.

Before Photo

The driveway had been heaved up by A large hapberry tree. Weeds had taken over the yard. The home itself was a “bizarre yellow shade, and that I didn’t have any clue where the front door was,” Glassman says. “There clearly was a hokey stucco wall, definite measures, stepping stones over there, weeds everywhere and erosion issues.”

See this sloped yard’s transformation

AFTER: Glassman first addressed the parking situation. He created an ingenious parking bay that allows guests to pull right up into the front part of the home, safely off the road. And because guests didn’t know where to enter the home before, frequently drifting into a driveway-side entrance instead of the front door, Glassman established a clear route to the entryway.

Steps today lead directly from the parking bay to the front door, and there is a terrace with a water feature. To take care of the erosion issues, Glassman installed acid-stained-steel retainer walls that terrace the landscape. He then took the Goldbergs on a trip to the nursery to hand pick plants trees and blossoms for the home.

Michael Glassman & Associates

The tree on the right is a crape myrtle, the only one on the house. On the left of this is a purple smoke tree. Reddish barberry plants operate their way.

The grayish tree on the far left is a fruitless olive, among three. The spiky dark bronze plant below it is a flax. The green pots hold kangaroo paw, sedum, succulents and Red-Hot Poker.

Michael Glassman & Associates

The tree nearest the parking bay is your myrtle, revealed here. The one to the right is another fruitless olive. A little ollie and an ice-blue shore juniper adorn the steel corner in the foreground. Ornamental grasses fill from the remainder. The plants repeat in odd numbers throughout the raised beds.

See this sloped yard’s transformation

More: Find plants for your dream landscape | Find a landscape builder near you

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