Makeover from the ground up
Palm Springs meets Japanese zen garden in this modern yard — front, sides and back
For 20 years, Billy Perryman lived happily with the landscaping he’d designed in his front yard and backyard shortly after moving into his Redland Estates home near U.S. 281 and Loop 1604.
But when the pandemic hit two years ago, the educational consultant found himself working from home. As he spent more time in the yard, he realized it had grown tired and outdated, and needed a radical redo.
The project, done in stages, replaced a fence, redesigned the side yards, added more features to the backyard and, finally, totally overhauled the front yard. By far the most dramatic of the updates, the front yard’s curved, organic lines and native landscape have been replaced with artificial turf and blocky, geometric hardscape for a clean, modern look.
Drought-tolerant and lowmaintenance, the look is enhanced by minimalist outdoor lighting, sparsely planted greenery and large poured-inplace concrete steppingstones whose rectangular shape echoes the modern garage and front doors, which had been replaced in 2017. The result looks unlike any other yard in the neighborhood, with influences borrowed from both Palm Springs and traditional Japanese gardens, but with a fun twist.
“People have said it looks like you could play miniature golf on my front lawn,” Perryman said, laughing.
Rather than do the entire front yard in artificial turf, Perryman said, he wanted to create visual interest by contrasting large rectangles of small, blackish-gray shadow stone with blocks of emerald green turf, separating the two with a border of bright white limestone landscape bricks.
“I like having the right angles in the design and the contrast between the two,” he said. “It really makes the edging pop.”
Perryman said the turf cost more than $10,000 and the shadow stone cost several thousand dollars more.
The first project Perryman tackled was in August 2020 when he installed a new, horizontal board fence in the backyard for a contemporary look that elevates the overall aesthetic and makes the yard appear larger.
“I’d already updated the garage and front doors, so I wanted to continue moving in that direction,” he said. “I wanted a fence that has style and artistry and is aesthetically pleasing — not just another utilitarian fence.”
Once that was completed, he turned his attention to the side yard, which he called “an outof-control, no man’s land,” where weeds poked through the landscape fabric, obscuring the rocks and yucca plants placed there. Because the narrow space between his house and the neighbor’s made it hard to grow anything (other than weeds), he decided to take the plunge and install artificial turf instead, adding an iron gate midway between the front and back.
Next, he upgraded the backyard, removing overgrown shrubbery, reconfiguring the curved flower beds and adding three water features. He kept the center area natural grass and added backyard landscape lighting.
“I like the fact that the backyard has more of a tropical feel, with more curves and more flowing plants, than the front,” he said. “At night it looks like a resort hotel back there.”
Finally, he turned his attention to the other side yard, which is much wider than the one on the opposite side of the house.
“I got to thinking, I’ve got this beautiful backyard, but there’s no way to nicely get to it from the front of the house,” he said. “I wanted to build a pathway that would prepare visitors for what they were about to see as they made that journey.”
The path he helped design is made of segmented cement steppingstones that vary in size as they jog around the airconditioning compressor and through another gate, with lighting to illuminate the path in the
evening.
“It was fabulous,” he said of the pathway, which is easily visible from the street. “I got a million positive comments about it. Even the school bus driver stopped me to compliment it.”
Trouble was, now the
front yard looked horrible by comparison.
“I didn’t accept the original builder’s landscaping package because I wanted a yard that reflected my style,” he said. “So I’d designed something with curved beds, metal edging and
native plants, and hired a company to install it.”
It was a look that no longer fit his personality.
“I had seen photographs of contemporary yards on HGTV, in magazines and on TV, and I just zeroed in on that; that’s what I liked.”
He told the company he was working with, San Antonio-based VHS Landscaping, that he wanted something clean, plain, even austere, with straight-arrow lines and razor-sharp, 90-degree corners.
Two large boulders dug up while the neighborhood was being built provide additional visual interest to the front yard, as does the shadow stone bed planted with lowgrowing drought-tolerant plants like santolina and a Mediterranean palm.
Perryman said that because the work was completed only a few months ago, it’s too soon to tell how much he’ll save on his SAWS bill. But he already likes not having to water as much as he used to.
“Water is a precious commodity, so it just seemed like a smart idea to install the turf,” he said.
He also likes how pristine and green the yard stays, regardless of how hot and dry it gets.
“I have a lawn service, but I still have to go out and pick up one or two leaves,” he said. “There’s something about artificial grass. It’s like carpet; you want to keep it clean.”