THE FRONT YARD SAYS, ‘WELCOME’
Bigger was not better for one L.A. family’s expansive, but isolated, front lawn — so they turned it into an enchanted garden for kids and parents alike. “We loved the house when we bought it,” said David Zabel of their 1920 Hancock Park home, but “the front yard was always very disjointed and disconnected from the house. It wasn’t particularly beautiful.”
A sea of turf grass — about 3,000 square feet — backed up to a wall of overgrown trees that hid the home from view. The yard was inaccessible from the house, and the house was uninviting from the curb. “At night it was very dark and a little gloomy, and of course it used a lot of water to keep it looking decent,” he said. Visitors had to walk up the driveway to get to the front door.
The family wanted to reclaim the space, make it more usable and inviting, and less thirsty. To make it happen, they hired designer Nick Dean.
The only thing the Zabels wanted to keep was a 90-year-old Australian tea tree that had grown horizontally. Dean not only saved it, he made it a focal point. He built a footbridge over the tree, with gnarled branches for railings, creating a path to a new courtyard and fountain. Under the bridge he planted wavy grasses (Festuca glauca Elijah Blue) to simulate a stream and built a hidden picnic table from reclaimed wood on-site, to create a play area for the couple’s daughters, then 7 and 9. “It’s a little bit magical and enchanted,” Zabel said. “We wanted it to feel like it had been there always.”
The project took about two months to plan and another four to five to complete, which they did with the help of an $8,700 rebate from the L.A. Department of Water and Power. Their total budget was about $50,000.
Zabel, a TV writer and producer, and wife Erin, a former baker and now full-time mom, knew little about plant varieties before they started but guided Dean on shapes and colors. Butterfly bush (Buddleia) and Mexican cigar plant (Cuphea ignea) turned out to be favorites, Erin Zabel said, and “we love the parrot’s beak” on the Lotus berthelotii.
She advised: Find plants you like to look at even when they’re not flowering.
Zabel says that now “I feel like I’m in a botanical garden visited by hummingbirds, butterflies and other pollinators.”
The couple estimate they’re saving 10% to 13% on their water bill. “We were spending more money on something that was less beautiful,” Erin said. Now it’s “a garden that has space we can live in and the kids can play.”