Serenity, now: Modesto garden goes from wild to mild

When Appril and Rob Stevens moved into their Sherwood Forest home seven years ago, they were faced with an immediate and high-profile challenge: a wild and overgrown front yard.

The Modesto couple met the challenge by clearing nearly everything out and turning chaos into a Zen and ordered landscape that’s garnered Garden of the Month honors for February from the Modesto Garden Club.

The home at 500 Barringham Lane had been vacant for five years when the Stevenses purchased it. While it had a mess of a yard, the house itself had solid bones in its 1967 Eichler-inspired design, with its low, flat roof line and clerestory windows along the front.

So they dug up the entire front yard, saving only some large decorative rocks, one large juniper and a prolific Meyer lemon tree. They planted several shrubs, added groundcover and some maple trees.

The pair also added accents, such as a small fountain and a dry rock stream bed. With no lawn, the yard today is waterwise and low maintenance.

Adding to the Zen and minimalistic nature of the landscape, the Stevenses repurposed bamboo from what had become a jungle in an equally overgrown backyard to create a decorative fence across a portion of the house’s front.

With both uplighting and downlighting to highlight the garden, a drive past the house at night offers a serene and lovely view to passers-by.

This story was originally published January 31, 2017 at 3:35 PM with the headline "Serenity, now: Modesto garden goes from wild to mild."