leveling

Putting the Architecture In Landscape Design Scott Chatham may be a landscape architect, but one recent award-winning project required he expand his range a bit, opening up a dining room to an outdoor courtyard designed in a bucolic French Country style. The courtyard wasn’t even on the clients’ radar when they brought Chatham, owner of Marietta, GA-based Chatham Landscape Services, in to look at the property. At the time, their greatest desire was for an enclosed, level front yard to provide their two young children and two family dogs a safe area to play ball and run around. Chatham specializes in residential projects of all types. “I design the job, and then we offer full project management and installation,” he says. “We take it from concept all the way to finished project.” A Level Playing Field In this project, Chatham faced several constraints, beginning with the clients’ desire to put the play area in the front of the home. The backyard, he explains, was dominated by a swimming pool which the clients opted to keep. Chatham says on his first visit to the site he recognized a large magnolia tree in the front of the home would have to go. “It blocked the whole front of the house from the street,” he says. “Not only couldn’t we plant grass around it, but the curb-appeal was being totally taken away.” The front lawn also sloped approximately five feet from the front of the house to the street. To solve this problem, ...