MAYFAIR DRIVE

This one was tough.

The backyard falls pretty hard toward the house, and the low part of the yard where the pool sits doesn’t really drain. We used boulders and steel to work with the slope and built a lot of drainage underneath everything. There’s a large French drain hidden between the pool and the concrete walk at the house, and a large catch basin underneath the deck.

We built this during the pandemic, when material prices were going crazy and sometimes we couldn’t even find bags of Portland cement or mortar. We were trying to fit a pool, a small bocce area, grilling space and a garden into a pretty difficult site and keep the whole thing within budget.

The homeowner is a really cool guy who has since left the corporate world to become a sculptor full time. I think that’s a pretty great transition.

There is a lot going on underneath this garden that you never see. I think it’s actually a pretty smart design.