DRY-STACKED FLOWER BEDS

Just like every other home we have ever built, we are having to start from scratch on our landscaping.  In order to even HAVE a yard, we had to take 18 inches of pad out.  Otherwise, when we added dirt and grass, our home would have been below ground level.  Therefore, you can see that the asthetic quality of the house is lacking around the base...with jagged parts of the foundation protruding.  So.....we are masking this with dry-stacked beds around the entire perimeter of the house.  These beds will be filled with easy-to-maintain groundcover.  And like the house, I want these beds to look as if they have been here for hundreds of years.

Dry-stacking is back-breaking manual labor!  After the first weekend, my husband and I decided we needed young, buff teenagers.  I hope we didn't scare them off after today!

Notice that our beds are double-stacked.  Really, as long as you are just dry-stacking 3 stones high, this is not necessary.  However, just to be on the safe side, and just to err on the side of caution, they doubled everything.  In reality, deadmen can be used ever so often for sturdiness.  Deadmen are stones turned with the end out and the majority of the stone's weight back into the bed.  When dirt is added, it adds even more stability.  Notice also that these doubled stones are lower than the front.  Dirt will cover the inside stone and no one will ever know that the wall is 2 stones thick.

Remember when you are dry-stacking stones.  Make sure they overlap in a brick pattern.  More importantly, each layer of stone should be back-stacked a bit which also gives more stability.  Otherwise, the pressure from the added dirt can push a wall right over.  I'm sure that would make a grown man cry!!!

I think they will finish the flowerbeds tomorrow afternoon.  Then on to the steps and the two retaining walls for my terraced yard.  Not long before we can get the dirt moved in and the yard started....