HEALDSBURG, CALIFORNIA

Moving Mountain Hillside Garden

This project represents the rebirth of a ranch house set in the foothills of Healdsburg’s Fitch Mountain, and transforming an outdated, neglected landscape into a garden filled with multiple destinations and moments to enjoy the site. To start, we re-envisioned the approach, replacing the asphalt looped driveway lined with scraggly plantings with guest parking spots and a layered landscape that provides a sense of peace and privacy for the arrival.

In the rear of the house, our goal was to create an interconnected series of spaces. The site plan follows the curving contours of the hillside, with a new pool (for her), bocce court (for him), and multiple smaller destinations within the garden. Due to its shifting soils, Fitch Mountain is often called the “moving mountain,” so deep piers anchor the new pool and terrace, set into the hill as it slopes down and away from the house.

Set at an angel to the pool terrace, the bocce court gives new life to an underutilized part of the site, an ancient landslide area. Leveled and surrounded with grasses, lomandra and sesleria, as well as several grand boulders and a bench on axis with the court, it has become a much used destination in the garden. Where the bocce and pool terraces meet, a curved wall built from stone from the site surrounds a new fire pit.

In another spot we carved out a small circular space in the landscape - defined by an existing palm and surrounded by complementary agaves, lomandra and red-hot poker - just enough for a good book or a quiet conversation.