A Bristol Backyard Made for Entertaining

“We would have never known where to start,” says Mary Ann Higgins, who bought a desirable corner lot home in Bristol with her husband Steve with an expansive yard that lacked privacy. The last time the property surrounding their home was landscaped was about 30 years ago, Mary Ann had learned, so she and Steve didn’t feel too bad when they decided it was time to start from scratch.

The couple turned to landscape architect Robyn Couturier of Land Lush Design to create a cohesive environment that offers ample space to entertain while keeping wide open area available. “Robyn’s mission was to come up with a private space without actually fencing us in – literally,” explains Mary Ann. “We had an idea of what we wanted... we wanted more of a patio space than a deck.” They also were determined to include an outdoor fireplace that family and friends could enjoy, and were hoping to have colorful blooms the whole year through. It was a tall order with unique hurdles for the experienced designer.

“The challenge was to make it private without looking overwhelming — like they didn’t want to talk to anyone,” says Robyn. In fact, it was quite the opposite. With grown children and grandchildren, a bevy of extended family, longtime friends and great neighbors, the Higginses wanted the space to be inviting, only without feeling like they were in a fishbowl. “They do a lot of entertaining; friends and neighbors come over,” says Robyn. “I think for them it’s become the friendly hub of the neighborhood. When they put the tiki torch out, they mean ‘come over,’” says Robyn, laughing.

Working alongside the couple, Robyn designed a two-level patio with retaining walls people can see over in lieu of a restrictive deck space. “We installed a patio – a combination of concrete, pavers and real stone,” she says, “so it was a challenge to have them all blend seamlessly.” To stay within budget, Robyn used Unilock pavers that offer a multi- tude of benefits including a wide range of natural colors and textures, in addition to being anywhere from double to quadruple times the strength of concrete. “It’s modeled after real stone and made from real stone forms,” Robyn explains. “They have up to 40 real stone forms and they make it right from that, and the concrete pavers helped keep the budget down. We wanted to make the patio surface blend with the walls and the fireplace so it didn’t look like two entirely different materials.” Plus Unilock offers a Transferable Lifetime Guarantee on the structural integrity of their paving stones, slabs and retaining wall units for residential use. “So you don’t have to worry about them cracking,” she says. “If one gets damaged, you can pop it out and replace it.” Using the pre-made pavers help to ease labor costs too as the time and craftsmanship it would take to carve each by hand would be a fortune, Robyn points out. The savings, of course, let the homeowners stay relatively within budget while allowing them to allocate funds elsewhere, including the all-natural stone, hand-crafted fireplace.

“Of course we had a budget in mind, and we went a little more extravagant than we expected,” concedes Mary Ann. “And we expanded some stone work in the front of the house, but we stayed comfortably within the budget. We gave Robyn a number knowing full well if we went a little beyond that, it would be okay.”

How did Robyn pull off the need to create privacy without installing an unsightly fence? She turned to Mother Nature. “When everything was planted and everything was all new, I put in three Vanderwolf Pines around the outside, and of course initially they were concerned, but now it’s exactly the way they want,” she says. The Higginses whole- heartedly agree — both about being concerned and coming around.

“The first year we really weren’t sure...” Mary Ann trails off. With wide gaps and baby plantings, the yard, frankly, looked piecemeal. Three years later, it’s a different story. “We’re just ecstatic really,” she says enthusiastically. The pines, she adds, have filled in perfectly, and the blooms always have something coming or going. “The intention was that we wanted something fairly low maintenance. We didn’t want to be tending to [the grounds] constantly throughout the season and we wanted something to give the garden color without having to replace things annually. Now we have something blooming pretty much throughout the year... It’s not constant work.”

Low maintenance and beautiful — just as Robyn envisioned it all. “Steven likes to prune things, so I put some [plants and shrubs] in that wouldn’t get too overgrown looking but I wanted it to look natural. I put in Redtwig Dogwoods, some hydrangeas, some Knock Out roses in the front... It takes about three years for the plantings to really root and come into their own.”

These are just some of the solutions, Mary Ann says, that make a landscape architect like Robyn, in her words, “worth the investment.”

“She just knows what blooms, how big plants are going to get. In ten years you don’t want to be invaded by something and she was able to come in and know what would do well and where,” she says.

And it didn’t stop there. Though not initially part of the project, Robyn and her team at Land Lush Design worked with the homeowners to fashion a welcoming front of the house to complement the inviting side and back yards. “We completely changed the front by ripping up a red brick walkway and installing a bluestone path,” explains Robyn. “It’s very warm, and we made it bigger too, so from the driveway to the door is a real entrance, really welcoming and adds lots of color.”

In just about two months’ time, Robyn took a Bristol yard from drab to fab, all the while creating an entire new space to create memories. “It’s not a five million dollar house in Barrington with unlimited funds,” Robyn points out. “We worked within the budget to make something really beautiful. They use the fireplace constantly and it’s nice to see they really use the space. This was one of my most rewarding projects.”