Before & After
Click on any picture to see a larger version. At the end of this post are the super before pictures from the day I bought the house.
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| My yard before, complete with dead rose bush (I purposefully killed it). |
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| My yard after. The sun is kind of blowing out the detail, thus the additional picture below. |
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| My yard after, taken in the morning with less sun so you can see better. All the green, leafy plants in the lower corner are Day Lilies and will bloom with yellow flowers. |
I'll post a picture of my yard again in the spring/summer after the plants have matured and/or bloomed. Some of them are dormant right now, and to stay within my budget, it was cheaper to get less mature plants that would grow into the yard.
History of the Project
I've had a beautiful plan for my front yard, including an awesome deck proposal, thanks to my friend Krista Percival (kplandscapedesign.com) that she designed for me right after I bought the house, but the few times I got quotes on implementing the plan, it was way outside my budget which was disheartening and why I never got anything done. If I intended to live here for 10 years, it would be easier to spend a lot of money on my dream cottage yard, but I don't think I'll be here more than 5 years (something I didn't tell Krista), and 2.5 years have already passed. So I needed to get something that looked nicer than dirt and weeds and incorporated the types of plants I like, but wouldn't cost more than $3000. When I graduate from my starter house to my for realsy house later on in life, I will definitely get a full-blown Krista Percival design though!
Luckily I found out that a friend of mine, Jeff Raymond, who recently moved to town, does landscaping and he gave me a very fair deal.
Aa web designer myself, I hate to say my yard is a modified version of the original design Krista created, because really it's quite different and I know Krista would agree this isn't her design - so lets call it inspired by the original plan instead. We used the same plant types and some of the layout/placement, but this is truly the budget version of what Krista originally envisioned. Plus the addition of a dry riverbed, a feature I'd become fond of in the past 12 months or so and thought would work well in my yard.
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| Another angle. The rocks in the front corner are b/c the street floods that corner of my yard every time it rains. The tree is a young crepe myrtle. |
In one weekend Jeff got 90% of the job done, and would have gotten it all done except the rock yard for my dry riverbed was closed on Sunday (even though their website said they weren't).
The Plants
One way we kept cost down is to reduce the number of plants, and even still, it was almost $1000 for plants. Another way to keep cost down, as mentioned, is to buy younger plants rather than fully mature ones. So it will take a while for them to really grow in, but that's okay.
There are two trees, an angel's trumpet, which is the yellow one by the window (we wanted to get the next size up, which would have been in a box, but all the super mature ones were gone everywhere because they're blooming now and in high demand. But that saved me about $100).
The second tree is a crepe myrtle, near the front corner by the driveway, which will bloom a dark pink.
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| The angel's trumpet got a little frost bitten but it will recover. Believe it or not, it's cold in San Diego in December! |
I think there are about 50 plants in the yard. All the plants are the ones Krista originally had in my plan; she spent a lot of time with me learning what I liked and figuring out the best plants that would require the least water. Some of the plants the nursery delivered, especially the ones in 5 gallon pots, were a little on the tiny side. But they'll mature and grow in over the year.
I linked the plant names to Google Image searches so you can see what things will look like when they bloom/are mature.
- Hemerocalis Hybrid - "Yellow Day Lilies" - they'll be yellow when they bloom, they're the green leafy things along the front and by the mailbox
- Kangaroo's Paws - love these; they're the tall, slender yellow and orange plants)
- Lantana - the red and yellow, and purple varieties; they don't look like much now, but that's b/c they're dormant
- Salvia Leucantha - "Mexican Sage Bush" - another fave of mine; along the wall under the window; these will grow into bigger bushes
- Rosmarinus Officianalis - "Rosemary" - smaller purple clusters strewn about the yard
- Feijoa Sellowiana - "Pineapple Guava shrub" - these are the bushes on either side of the house
- Coleonema Pulchellum 'Sunset Gold' - the small yellow, spiky ones stewn on either side of the yard
- Polygala - "Petite Butterfly Sweet Pea" - the two shrubs on either side, near the middle. These will have tiny purple flowers.
- Aeonium Schwarzkopf - succulents - my original plan (which called for aeonium urbicum - "dinner plate"), these are the 3 at the front, and 4 next to the driveway.
I also had Jeff trim my palm tree since the city doesn't maintain street-side trees anymore. It was a huge job, but I'm so glad it's done! The sidewalk looks more open. And it's perfect that the day was dreary for my before and brilliant for the after picture.
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| Palm Tree before |
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| Palm Tree after |
For irrigation, Jeff installed a drip system. There are drips on every plant; the small ones get one drip, the larger get two. Each drip puts out 1 gallon of water per hour but I only need to run the drip system for 25 minutes.
The Neighbors
I was telling Jeff about how the couple who owns the rental across the street always manage to drive by the day I've done some new work (they don't live in the neighborhood) and they're always really excited about what I've done (remove the trees, put in a brick planter and walkway, painted the house), but the next question out of their mouths is always "are you painting the house next?" or after I painted the house "are you doing your landscaping next?". And funny enough, not 10 minutes after I told Jeff about them, they showed up (they must have a survalence camera pointed at my house!). I was inside, so I didn't get questioned about my next project, although they have nothing left to nitpick since everything they can see from the street is now done. They did chat with Jeff about doing some work for them though, so that's good for him.
I'm waiting for my annual Christmas card from this couple, and dammit, it better say how awesome my yard looks. (Author's note: I wrote most this post before Christmas - I did get the neighbors' card and it did in fact say "your house looks great!").
My House on Purchase Day vs. My House Today
The true before and after =)
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| June 2009 |
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| December 2011 |
Next project? The backyard which is getting installed this week. I spoiled my house for Christmas this year. (Editor's Note 1/6/12: the backyard is done! Read about it in my Backyard Makeover post)
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