Xeriscape beauty on a budget

This home in an inner-ring Cleveland suburb is surrounded by many rental or two-family homes with minimal landscaping. Its heavy clay soil retains water and drains poorly, Schwartz says, noting that the low soil level in the back needed to be raised. The front faces East and is unobstructed; the back faces West and has good light in the morning, full sun in the afternoon.

The client, a woman in her 60s with limited mobility, wanted "simple but nice" — with low maintenance and lots of color. On the to-do list was to remove all turf, reconfigure the front walk, replace the back steps and created a relaxing, outdoor grill area in the back.

The front walk and back walks were reconfigured into wide sweeps. The front walks now allow unfettered access from either side of the property to the front door while journeying through the landscape.

In the back, the curvilinear theme of the front walk and the existing concrete driveway was continued with a wide sweeping walk to the back staircase to allow for easy conveyance of groceries and packages. There are also an arc and tangent patio, both poured in concrete. The dimensions of the patio were sized to those of a small canvas gazebo that the client had previously purchased. Although the back staircases, badly in need of replacement, were redesigned, budgetary constraints have left that work to the future. The client now loves to look out the windows, spend time on the patio, and welcome visitors.

When the sod was stripped from the front, the grade was adjusted with the excess soil being moved to the back, and the soil was amended with local leaf humus. A large boulder, unearthed during the soil prep, was used as a focal point amid the Amsonia in the front bed. After the plantings were installed, the landscape was mulched with either gravel or shredded bark, both from local sources, depending on the needs of the plants. The treelawn was amended with gravel to facilitate drainage and the growth of a groundcover Sedum. The chips from a tree stump were ground out and used to mulch a previously weedy area between the garage and the neighbor’s garage. The new front walk is permeable, with existing stone from the back now set into gravel. Although the back walk and patio are concrete, the soil has been graded so that runoff flows to the back of the property, where much of it is absorbed by the heavily mulched area between the garages. Little water is being used to maintain this xeriscapic landscape after the first year of establishment.

"Habitat has been created where, formerly, there was none," Schwartz concludes.