Hardscape
Hardscape
- What are Hardscape?
- Hardscape Design
- Why Your Need a Professional
- Patios and Walkways
- Water Features, Rock Gardens and Flower Beds
- Decks, Fences and Arbors
- Raised Beds and Retaining Walls
- Drainage and Erosion Problems, Solutions
- Outdoor Living: Privacy, Safety and Outdoor Living Spaces
- Paver Design and Installation
What are Hardscape?
Hardscape or landscape construction is everything in the landscape that is NOT plantings. It is not alive. It does not grow. With small exceptions it does not change its form after the job is completed. What you see is usually what you get.
Landscape construction DEFINES your outdoor space in the same way that planting beautifies outdoor space. Its results are usually immediate and in most cases permanent. It allows your landscape to become architecture, to make a statement about who you are!
Hardscape Design
Grasshopper Landscape Service designs many different types of Hardscape.
We can create outdoor rooms. Garden walls might be fencing, wooden screening, solid panels of brick and stone, short retaining walls, or taller, free-standing enclosure walls. Floors can be segments of suspended decking, all types of paving, or visually can even be horizontal planes of water. Ceilings are normally partial ceiling such as awning, arbors, or trellises, but will sometimes become a fully functional ceiling as with the summerhouse, pavilion, or pool house.
Grasshopper can use many specialized items to bring life and diversity to your garden. Expressions such as water features, water lighting, circulation, and exterior enclosures that constitute well-planned and fully integrated livable areas.
Hardscape projects range from creating water features to building patios. Patios and Walkways Water Features, Rock Gardens and Flower Beds Decks, Fences and Arbors Raised Beds and Retaining Walls Drainage and Erosion Problems, Solutions Outdoor Living: Privacy, Safety and Outdoor Living Spaces Pest Control When You Need a Pro Patios and Walkways. Hardscape projects can greatly enhance your enjoyment of your yard. Features such as patios and walkways can add not only beauty, but also functionality to your landscape.
Why You Need a Professional
Some tasks are too dangerous to be considered do it yourself projects. In other cases, you may lack the time, energy or skills required to do the job. There’s a lot to be said for knowing when to call Grasshopper Landscape Service. Just remember that, sometimes, in order to avoid costly property damage (e.g., from falling trees, or from drainage or erosion problems) later, it makes good financial sense to call us in before a problem gets worse.
Patios and Walkways
Grasshopper Landscape Hardscape projects can greatly enhance your enjoyment of your yard. Features such as patios and walkways can add not only beauty, but also functionality to your landscape.
Water Features, Rock Gardens and Flower Beds
Water features are not only visually appealing, but also emit soothing sounds. Once you’ve experienced ponds, you may even decide to advance to the next level: waterfalls. Either way, Grasshopper Landscape Service can install water-loving plants around your water features to further their visual appeal. Rock gardens, by contrast, are usually planted with vegetation that thrives in drier conditions. If neither water gardens nor rock gardens suit you, you may consider flower beds
Decks, Fences and Arbors
Like patios and walkways, Grasshopper Landscape Service can create these “hardscape” elements to bring structure to your landscaping.
Raised Beds and Retaining Walls
Building large retaining walls is not considered a do it yourself project. If you need a tall wall, chances are you have an erosion problem “waiting to happen” and need to call on Grasshopper Landscape Service professional expertise. By contrast, simple terracing jobs are another excellent hardscape project. After building small stone retaining walls, we can plant behind them, as you would for a raised bed. We can also build a sort of “raised bed” that could come in especially handy for urban landscaping, where no garden space, per se, exists.
Drainage and Erosion Problems, Solutions
Drainage problems can be a real drain on your time and energy. Solving drainage problems sounds easy, in theory: find out where the excess water is coming from and why gravity isn’t enough, in this case, to send it on its merry way. Then take the necessary steps to channel it away. In practice, it’s not that easy which is when you need to call Grasshopper Landscape Service
Outdoor Living: Privacy, Safety and Outdoor Living Spaces
Why do we divide our indoor living spaces into separate rooms? The need for privacy is part of the reason. But also consider that a component suitable for installation in a kitchen, for instance, might be out of place in a bedroom. The same is true for outdoor living spaces. A swimming pool area, for instance, should be tailored to the activity it will see; your needs in that space are quite different than, say, your needs in a garden area. Let Grasshopper Landscape Service use our expertise to create outdoor “rooms”. We can also help you discover ways to achieve privacy for your outdoor living.
Landscape Paver Design and Installation
Our Grasshopper Landscape Service landscape architects are able to create a variety of hardscapes using landscape pavers. Pavers are now available in a variety of patterns and colors that can resemble natural stones and random cobblestones.
An interlocking paver system is comprised of several parts:
- The existing compacted soil is excavated to the appropriate elevation and a layer of geotextile fabric is laid over the soil.
- A compacted base material is added, which consists of compacted gravel ranging in a depth of 4 to 12 inches depending on the application.
- A layer of bedding sand is placed over the compacted gravel, to hold and support the pavers from below.
- The actual pavers are placed.
- The entire perimeter is then surrounded by an edge restraint and joint sand is swept into the cracks.
- The entire area is compacted again to produce a hardscape that is far more durable than any asphalt, concrete or mortared stone hardscape.
Landscape pavers are a great choice for a hardscape material for a number of reasons. Pavers are designed to be a fluid hardscape system. They are extremely durable and able to disperse weight better than concrete or mortared stone. So under extreme weight a landscape paver will distribute the weight to its gravel base rather than crack. If a paver does crack or is damaged, only the single paver must be replaced as opposed to the entire hardscape. In situations where tree roots and soil shifting would crack conventional concrete or mortared stone work, landscape pavers will simply move with the soil. It’s also easier to repair this damage than with concrete or mortared stone. Instead of replacing the entire cracked area, landscape pavers are removed, the damaged base is adjusted and the pavers are then placed back onto the repaired base. There is no need to purchase new pavers.