When this family came to us for help reconfiguring their backyard landscaping, they had a covered deck on the back of the house, but it was detached from the rest of the yard and lacked an inviting transition down to the lawn.

“We had several goals for our landscape design — an outdoor seating area for our very sloped back yard, low maintenance (but lush!) landscaping, a vegetable garden that didn’t look like a typical veggie garden, a bird-friendly habitat, underground drainage, and specialized micro-irrigation for planters,” said homeowner Terri Harding.

Carex Design Group solved the problem of poor access to the lawn by designing a raised patio that shortened the transition and gave them an additional seating area. For the new patio, we used Belgard’s Tandem wall block and column — a favorite product at Carex Design Group.

We also used the open space in the interior of the column to recess planter boxes to help soften the space. In addition to adding irrigation and landscape lighting, we updated the landscaping in the yard and added a crescent-shaped raised planter that would serve as a stylish vegetable garden.

“Bob came through with everything … and kept us informed as to what would happen when. Everything looks beautiful and I am very pleased with the quality of design and Carex Design Group’s knowledge of materials and plants,” said Harding.”The level of detail [in the design] was perfect for [Carex Design Group’s preferred] landscape contractors to bid and do the work,” Terri Harding.