The goals for this garden were to create habitat for children, for free play within a native plant habitat garden. It has topiary, lawn, flatness, and sculpting. It's on the edge of Volunteer Park, so we were trying to kind of knit it back into the park to let the pretend like the park is coming around and giving it a big hug, and bringing some of that wildness into the backyard and around to the front yard.

I made this spectrum with a x axis and y axis as way to connect the gardens I’m talking about today. There’s no dogma to it, take it or leave it. So on one axis is a spectrum from controlled to not controlled, and on the other is a spectrum from a fixed picture to a dynamic/evolving garden. This garden is more highly controlled because it’s in tighter quarters, and I’d say the front garden, in full sun, is a more dynamic/evolving garden that will take a fair amount of control or stewardship over time to let it turn into a more mature planting with different canopy layers.

We planted a very dense and diverse tapestry of bear roots and plants from pots. We took the flat level, we added a hill feature with a creek coming down with it to mirror the groundwater that moves that way from the park, and to topographically feel more connected to the park. We're also doing habitat, native plant restoration on the outside of the fence as park stewards to create more of a complex habitat edge.

Landscape construction by Avid Landscape

Plants sourced from: Xera, Nursery, Cistus, and Hardy Fern Foundation

Photos by Jonathan Hallet and Chris Copeland