LASN is a photographically oriented, professional journal featuring topics of concern and state-of-the-art projects designed or influenced by registered Landscape Architects.
Issue link: https://landscapearchitect.epubxp.com/i/457513
60 Landscape Architect and Specifier News The new owners of a 1920 Tudor home located on almost one acre in southwest Colorado Springs, Colo., wanted to create an outdoor space where they could relax, entertain, and enjoy their dogs. The house and grounds had not been updated in several decades, so major renovations were needed inside and outside. From 1920 to Today The existing pool had settled several inches at its northeast corner. The back patio, a patchwork of concrete pours over the years, had several downspouts emptying onto the pavement. The patio had settled and created drainage issues near the house. The existing backyard terracing consisted of treated timbers, concrete walls, and random boulders placed into slopes. Even with the existing makeshift terraces, the turf area still had slopes exceeding 25 percent in some areas, wasting water and causing more drainage issues behind retaining walls. A historic octagonal "tuberculosis hut" from the Woodman Sanatorium, formerly used to house recovering tuberculosis patients in the early 20th century, was relocated to this site in the late 1940s. While currently used as a pool changing room, its location under a grove of scrub oak trees adjacent to one of the terraced walls proved unfortunate. The structure was rotting away at its base because of built up leaf debris and ponding water runoff. Things to Consider The most important consideration for the design was to solve the drainage issues around the property, particularly at the back patio and the pool areas. The pool needed to be releveled, and the cracked and settled pool deck completely removed Above Renovations to the backyard included replacing terracing structures of timber, concrete and boulders and releveling the pool and deck. The previous slope, even with the terracing, exceeded a 25 percent grade in some places, causing drainage issues that were remedied by the new stone retaining walls. Releveling the pool required removing the concrete and all of the coping and tile around the top pool edge. A new concrete base was poured for a larger pool deck and pool coping, both then covered with 2,500 square feet of mortared flagstone. (Continued on page 62)