Turning your outdoor living space into something timeless and magical can be done with a few landscaping strategies involving masonry. By incorporating fire features, water features, a retaining wall, and updating your patios and walkways, you can give your landscape a wonderful “been there forever” appeal as well as enhance your usable space in Setauket and Oyster Bay, NY.
Related: 6 MASONRY TIPS TO TRANSFORM YOUR FRONT YARD LANDSCAPE DESIGN IN MANHASSET, NY
Fire Features
Expert masonry offers the perfect opportunity to build stunning and functional fire features in your outdoor living space. Fire-rated concrete blocks with natural or manufactured stone veneers offer nearly endless design versatility for outdoor fireplaces. Fire pits can be made to look rudimentary or wholly modern to provide either an authentic campfire feel or, with a gas-powered feature, simply set the ambiance. Fire tables also make for memorable outdoor dining experiences. No matter what feature you choose, fire features will help establish your landscape as a warm and inviting place to be.
Water Features
Adding the sonic and visual quality of splashing water can amplify the drama of your landscape or provide a soothing white noise for ultimate relaxation. Adding a masonry-based waterfall to your landscape will give a natural feeling to your gathering spaces that help you and your family and guests focus on the conversation instead of distant road noise. Similarly, the fountain can be built to any design style and make your backyard atmosphere much more festive. Combining either of these features with your pool could provide the ultimate in outdoor enjoyment.
Retaining Walls
Retaining walls can be built for many reasons including following a boundary, but they also make excellent landscape additions within your property line. The primary purpose of a retaining wall is to help control erosion and add usable outdoor living space. Retaining walls also provide excellent opportunities for added seating (without the clutter of additional patio furniture) and a place to spotlight colorful planters with seasonal flowers. The retaining wall’s design can follow the aesthetics of your home and landscape, and you can personalize the wall with accents and borders and special features like artwork niches. You can even incorporate outdoor lighting fixtures into the wall, to reduce visual clutter while adding just the right amount of ambiance and safety to your outdoor living spaces.
Updating Patios, Walkways, and Driveways
Horizontal surfaces can be much more than utilitarian spaces for placing outdoor furniture and cooking elements or for parking your cars. They are an opportunity for artistic expression, and a way to add elegance to your home life. Updating a patio or a walkway with natural stone or concrete pavers gives you design versatility and helps ground your home with the landscape design.
For an added eco-friendly touch, you can opt for permeable pavers, which help keep the patio or walkway surface drier while allowing rainfall and snowmelt to seep into the ground below rather than pooling on the surface or running off. This is a popular feature on driveways, where the combination of permeable pavers and in-ground driveway heating systems mean no more ice and no more shoveling.
Whatever your design aesthetic, you can find natural stone or concrete pavers to give you the perfect combination of looks and practicality.
