The West Lake Garden
A once-empty side yard, walked past more than it was used, rebuilt as the family's primary outdoor gathering space around their existing pool.
The clients' existing pool sat in a plain concrete surround with almost no shade and nowhere comfortable to sit nearby. We reworked the deck in honed travertine, added a shallow reflecting extension at the pool's north edge, and built a steel-framed arbor over a new dining terrace that keeps the space usable through Austin's hottest months.
Planting beds surrounding the pool use cenizo, Turk's cap, and a mix of salvias chosen to draw hummingbirds and butterflies without dropping debris into the water — a common complaint from the family's previous landscape. A low stone wall separates the pool terrace from a small lawn used mostly by the family's dog.
The arbor's steel posts were fabricated locally and finished to match the home's existing window frames, tying the new structure back to the architecture rather than treating it as a separate addition.
Tarrytown Courtyard
Thinking About Your Pool Area?
A pool surround is often the highest-traffic part of a property — and one of the easiest to get wrong.