Hardscape
Hardscape: the part of the yard that has to be right first
Paving, walls and levels are the skeleton. They decide where water goes, where people walk, and what the planting is allowed to do.
Hardscape is the built structure of a landscape: stone entries and columns, driveways, sand-finished concrete decking and pathways, interlocking and porcelain pavers, retaining walls, boulder walls, garden walls, and precast or poured-in-place coping. Brooks Landscape and Design builds all of it, and builds it before the planting, because every one of those elements decides where water goes.
Drainage is the whole job, wearing a decorative surface
Almost every hardscape failure we are called to look at is a water failure. Paving that heaved, a wall that bowed, a patio that pushed water at a foundation, a lawn that stayed wet all winter: the surface gets blamed and the fall of the ground is the cause.
Getting this right is unglamorous, it is most of the cost that is not visible in a photograph, and it is the difference between a patio at ten years old and a patio that had to be taken out at five.
Retaining walls are structures, not tall garden edging
On the sloped lots common in Thousand Oaks, Agoura Hills, Calabasas and Malibu, a retaining wall holds real load and often needs engineering, drainage behind it and a permit. A wall built to a height it was not designed for does not fail gently.
Boulder walls are a different instrument: they can hold a slope while reading as landscape rather than construction, and on rocky ground near Santa Susana they can look like the ground the house was cut into, because in effect they are.
Choosing a surface you can live with
Choosing a surface you can live with comes down to area, temperature and ground movement. Sand-finished concrete is the workhorse: it takes a large area calmly and it does not fight the house. Interlocking pavers can be lifted and reset, which matters over a service run or a settling area. Porcelain is dimensionally precise and stays cooler underfoot than most dark stone. Natural stone brings variation that manufactured products imitate, at more money and more labor.
The wrong question is which is best. The right question is which one suits the size of the area, the temperature it sits at in August, and the amount of movement the ground under it is going to do.
Questions people actually ask
Pavers or poured concrete?
Pavers where the surface may need to be lifted, where movement is likely, or where a smaller unit suits the scale. Poured concrete where a large calm surface is wanted and the sub-base is sound. Both are correct answers to different sites, and cost alone is a poor way to choose between them.
Does a retaining wall need a permit?
Frequently, and it depends on height, surcharge and jurisdiction. We establish that for the specific address before designing the wall, because a wall redesigned after a plan check is a redesign of everything that sits on top of it.
Can hardscape fix a drainage problem I already have?
Often yes, because drainage problems are usually grade problems and hardscape is how grade gets rebuilt. It has to be diagnosed first: paving over standing water without changing where the water goes moves the problem rather than solving it.
Other services
The other services Brooks Landscape and Design performs, usually on the same project as hardscape.
- 3D Landscape DesignWalk the finished yard before a shovel moves.
- Pools & SpasCustom pools, spas, waterfalls, streams and water walls.
- Outdoor KitchensBarbecues, pizza ovens, bars and polished concrete counters.
- Outdoor LivingFireplaces, fire pits, arbors, overhangs and seat walls.
- Softscape & IrrigationPlanting, lighting, irrigation, drainage, turf and dry river beds.
Tell us about the property
Send a few lines about what you have and what you want. We will tell you what we think it takes, what order it should happen in, and whether we are the right company for it.