The landscape started with the rainwater tank, which we had already turned into a patio.  Also, during excavation, we removed enough of the existing clay soil to allow us to bring in good soil (we used 45 yards of garden mix and another 25 of compost on top of that).  We had previously decided to built a low privacy wall  which is also a planter box (from the 1000 old bricks we'd saved- for  pictures, click here and also here.) along much of the S side, because the intention was to eat outside for much of the summer.  Because the rainwater tank top is the hottest place on our site, we decided to built a second patio area in the southwest corner because it is shaded by trees.  Also, since this corner sloped downward, we decided to build it as a sunken patio instead, adding some visual interest to the yard.

The front yard naturally divided into two sections, divided by the driveway, so the ADU has its own front yard. The backyard is fairly narrow because its a small lot, but the NW corner was spacious enough to build a little sitting area we call the "serenity garden" (picture, click here).

An important aspect of our landscape was to keep it all pervious, so that water is absorbed into the ground instead of running off into the sewers.  To do this, we used pervious paving on the driveway (picture, click here), and broken concrete and slate pieces for walkways (picture, click here).  Our only two impervious surfaces are the roof of the house (which sends water to the rainwater tank, and the tank itself (whose runoff runs through the brick planter box).

The broken concrete walkway is entirely from our own left over concrete, but the various rubble concrete retaining walls are from material we got free by looking on craigslist.org, where we had no problem finding someone giving away concrete chunks only a short drive away.  In order to use our own concrete, we would have had to store it for over a year, and we just didn't have space.

We did a first round of planting in October 2004, and a second this spring (2005), but won't finish until at least this fall due to drought conditions in Seattle this year.  After that, our gardens won't look very done until at least the fall of 2006.

Our landscape is all watered from the rainwater tank via a drip irrigation system, which we got a www.dripworks.com (they were very helpful).

To get an update on how this is going, click here.