The Turnkey Landscape

 

Cynthia and Don Ritts develop custom homes for a living, buying lots in upscale neighborhoods and building high-end houses on them. The couple’s three previous developments were homes they lived in for a short time before selling them off to lucky buyers. However, their latest project, a four-bedroom, four-and-a-half bath, 4,009-square-foot home in Kahala, was the first they built strictly to sell.

The Lush Life: An open door creates a seamless connection between the indoors and the outdoors.

As construction was reaching a close, the Rittses needed a landscape that would complement their contemporary Hawaiian home. It had to be tropical, with a distinctive Island feel. It also had to look great as soon as it was put into the ground, as well as be able to grow with the new homeowners. In other words, the new landscape needed to be designed to sell, and also designed to last.

“When you’re selling a home, a good or bad landscape can make or break a deal,” says Cynthia. “But not only can it be a deal maker, a great landscape can also pay great dividends. All the studies show that, whatever money you put into the landscape, you get back double.”

A surprisingly small palette of plant material creates a lush landscape, instantly.

The Rittses hired husband-and-wife team Greg and Terri Lee, of Landscapes by Tropical Images, to design and install their instant landscape. Cynthia had a handful of plants that she wanted in her yard and a few others that she didn’t want. Greg reviewed a list of prospective plants with her and together they came up with a surprisingly simple palette of plant material. Cynthia left most of the design concepts up to Greg.

“Even though the house is high-end and the eventual homeowners will be able to afford to hire someone to take care of it, we wanted to build a low-maintenance landscape,” says Greg. “We didn’t want the homeowners to be picking up leaves every single week, or having maintenance people in the yard doing work all the time. You want to be outside and the last thing you want to be thinking about is yard work.”

While the Kahala property was spacious at 10,000 square feet, the large, one-story house and its elegant pool took up a sizable chunk of space. In addition, the lot had an unusual trapezoid shape, so Greg had several relatively thin corridors of real estate on which to install plant material. Complicating matters was the need to use larger plants in the landscape, because the garden needed to look full and grown-in soon after installation. These full-grown plants can be installed in closer proximity to their neighbors, but they still need a considerable amount of growing space. It takes a deft hand and a deep knowledge of the plants’ characteristics to pull off the arrangement successfully.

In the backyard, the Lees started by planting a perimeter of largish palm trees, arecas for screening and the brilliant-red sealing-wax palms for color. Inside of that elegant wall of red and green, they added more color, with large, red-ginger plants. Low-growing philodendron xanadu fill in the lower levels, while big hapuu ferns occupy strategic focal points in the garden. A full-grown traveler’s palm, with fronds fanned out like a deck of cards, provides further visual interest, while decorative kalo, both green and black, add a touch of the exotic.

Just Add Water: The pool dominates the back yard with landscaping pushed to the perimeter of the property. Uplit traveler’s and phoenix palms add drama.

“I really wanted the kalo, because you don’t usually see that in landscapes, and it is so Hawaiian,” says Cynthia. “It’s a real eye-catcher. However, it is more important that the whole landscape comes together rather than showcasing one particular plant. I think the Lees did a great job doing just that.”

The Lees installed a lawn of seashore paspalum around the pool and throughout sunny areas of the yard. The fairly hearty variety of grass, known mostly for its high saltwater tolerance, is also extremely soft underfoot, an important consideration for a home in which residents will be spending a good deal of time outside.

One of the Lee’s custom-made, hand-blown, glass lighting fixtures.

In the front yard, the Lees added the striking bridal bouquet plumeria plant, the colorful and swordlike mother-in-law’s tongues and several craggy strawberry guava trees, another of Cynthia’s favorites.

All throughout the property, both front and back, the Lees installed an irrigation system and landscape lighting that highlighted the plants and various garden features.

“This turned out way beyond my expectations. For a newly installed landscape, I’ve never seen anything quite this nice,” says Cynthia of her eight-week-old yard. “I wanted it to look as full and mature as it could. It does and it’s brand new.”

“This landscape was beautiful from day one,” says Terri. “Most of the time, you have to wait for things to mature, but, in this case, you can just hand over the keys to the new homeowner and say: Here you go, it’s time for you to enjoy your new home and garden.”

Before homeowners head off to the garden center and nursery with hopes of creating an instant landscape, they should be aware that these immediate backyard wonders come at considerable expense, costing from between two and three times more than standard landscapes. Most of the extra expense involves the purchase of plant material that is larger and more mature.

Sometimes, instant landscaping is beyond the capabilities of all but the most well-equipped homeowners. Large field stock trees need to be dug out with a back hoe and lifted by a crane. The heavy equipment needs to be used again when it comes time to plant the tree in the new landscape. In addition, installation can be a complicated and delicate operation.

“This isn’t something your average homeowner should undertake,” says Gary Shinn, of Hokuahi Lawns. “You have to know what you’re doing, and you have to be careful of what you’re doing. It’s a very big plant, which is going to need room to grow. However, if you do it right, it will look like it has been there forever.”

If instant gratification is a must, homeowners can cut costs by being selective about which plants and trees they purchase full grown and which they are willing to wait to grow in.

“If you’re a young couple and you’re buying a home that you expect to live in for the next 35 years, how important is an extra couple of months or maybe even several years of waiting?” asks Steve Dewald, of Steve’s Gardening Service. “But if time is important to you, there are ways to spend your money wisely, so you get the most bang for the buck. For instance, I can install an irrigation system and put grass in, if I use stolans [grass roots and runners] and sprigs rather than grass sod [large, carpetlike chunks of grass]. It’s only a matter of waiting a couple of months for your lawn to grow in. After that they look exactly the same, and you have an irrigation system for the same money.”

Dewald says that homeowners should spend their money on the plants that make the most impact: the large trees and palms that often are placed in gardens’ focal points. Shrubs like hibiscus grow quickly, but dwarf date and phoenix palms, both very popular, are slow growers, so investing in a larger specimen is money well spent.

According to Richard Long, of Reliable Landscaping & Sprinklers, keeping the landscaping relatively simple can cut costs and confusion. A limited selection of plant materials in a garden is more pleasing to the eye than a hodgepodge collection of flowers and shrubs.

“People like to see patterns or consistent themes, they’ll notice when something is out of place or cluttered,” says Long. “But also, a limited collection of plants makes things easier for the homeowners, especially if they are trying to install an instant landscape. Less variety of plants means things grow more uniformly and consistently. You won’t have to replant or remove things as your garden starts to mature.”

It’s All in the Lighting: Instead of using attention-grabbing tiki torches, landscapers Greg and Terri Lee chose to illuminate the garden with more subtle lights, which highlight the plants and set the mood both inside and out.

Homeowners can cut costs by confining their instant landscape to only a small section of their property, while letting the rest of the yard grow in slowly. According to Susan Mulkern, of Water Gardens by Mulkern, homeowners often request instant front lawns or entryways to get immediate curb appeal, or they may want a fully formed backyard, so they can have a housewarming party or other special occasion, such as a wedding reception. Sometimes they need a grassy area for a pet.

However, Mulkern cautions that, while the landscape may look completed, it is still immature and taking root, so homeowners should tread lightly. “Since they look like fully grown-in lawns, people tend to walk on sodded yards, which can lead to a little die back,” says Mulkern. “Once or twice is OK, but a weekly barbecue could mean trouble for the grass.”

Mulkern says that, over the past 10 years, the demand for instant landscaping has been steadily rising, to approximately 40 percent of all their jobs. “People are a little more impatient nowadays,” says Mulkern. “They just don’t have a lot of time on their hands and they don’t want to wait and they have the money. An instant landscape sure can look nice in a hurry. But most of it is about using good sense and taking a look at your wallet and seeing what you can afford. You don’t have to do the whole place. You can get the satisfaction of watching your garden grow in and save money at the same time. That’s even better.”