Just Add Water: The Key to a Relaxing Retreat

By Robert Mowat, ASLA

Photos courtesy of Robert Mowat Associates

A raised spa doubles as both a waterfall feature and swimming element. The river washed rock matches the masonry pattern located on nearby site retaining walls bringing a cohesive whole to the raised vertical elements.

Water turned out to be a key element for a home in Saratoga, near San Jose, Calif., turning it into an enchanting resort, retreat and home base for a client who travels weeks at a time across the globe. The client, an international executive, spends so much time away that his idea for a home landscape is that it be as peaceful and restful as possible?EUR??,,????'??+while reminding him of his youth in a more tropical climate. The single-acre site gently slopes from front to back and has views of the hills beyond. The new home is designed in a classic, single-story style of architecture.

This view of the waterfall-cascading pools helps to connect the view of the Santa Cruz Mountains beyond. This is the main view upon entering the home and looking through the main dining room.

Design Challenges

Bringing together a vacation and tropical atmosphere in a sophisticated fashion without creating kitsch was one design challenge. The context of suburbia along with the local cooler-temperate climate presented a challenge to the owner?EUR??,,????'???s wish for a tropical-retreat atmosphere . The designers initially focused on a new, innovative look for the front yard; one that would resemble a spa more than a typical suburban yard with a lawn, three trees and some foundation planting. The client wanted a welcoming front where he and the neighbors would enjoy a view of water.

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The builder?EUR??,,????'??+along with the city?EUR??,,????'??+were initially strongly opposed to any water element in the front yard other than a small ornamental fountain product. The Landscape Architects persevered and created two shallow reflecting ponds with water wall backdrops on each side of the entry walk. The idea of a dominating front lawn was abandoned. The single walk left the designers two very separate and distinct spaces. These were filled with a strong boxwood design anchored by a Bradford pear allee. The existing trees at the sides were left to fill out and blur the edges of the property lines.

The wood deck off of the master bedroom allows the owner to sit and enjoy the tranquil setting and views beyond. Chinese wisteria on the arbor is complemented by banana plants and grasses along the pond edges.

The rear yard is a series of landscape elements linked by a system of axis, or connecting lines. A traditional Japanese alignment technique was used to create order out of this informality. The spaces were to relate to one another, yet seem informal in their arrangement. An outdoor entertaining patio, lookout patio, private retreat, ponds, pool and spa waterfall all interact with one another on the property. The series of informal axis allowed all of these items to visually or functionally connect.

The privacy wall also hides a second smaller private spa located conveniently next to the master bathroom. This spa is tucked behind banana plants and the raised edges of the waterway.

One waterway begins at the head of a manufactured concrete wall with planting pockets. Water flows down the wall in several areas dotted with plantings. The owner?EUR??,,????'???s indoor glass shower is hidden from neighbor views by the constructed wall of concrete. This waterway flows from a private spa across the front of a bedroom deck and ultimately ends in front of the formal dining room. Another Japanese technique of Shakkei (borrowed scenery) was employed here for dramatic effect. From this room one can look up the waterway to the waterfall and the hills beyond.

?EUR??,,????'??Mystery and surprise are important parts of the designer?EUR??,,????'???s recipe. With ballet dance and horse dressage in mind, the team strove to keep everything natural and easy?EUR??,,????'????EUR??,,????'???EUR??,,????'??+Robert Mowat

The challenge of creating an appropriate resort-type pool in an informal lagoon style was compounded by the fact that a safety law requires pools to have either an enclosing fence or automatic pool cover. The designers set about to create a natural-looking edge while trying to engineer a coping system that supported a hidden pool cover track.

These dual reflecting ponds at a Saratoga, Calif. home serve as a formal framing the front door entry. The fountains serve as a unique and unusual front yard design element.

Water Feature Innovation

The design team succeeded in creating one of the first irregular, concrete-edged pool cover design systems with an under-track attachment system in the U.S. The concrete pool decking was cantilevered out three feet and engineered to support live and dead (boulder) loads, while having the ability to be covered with an automatic under-coping pool-cover track. Two separate pool covers converge together to meet in the middle of the pool. This unusual solution created a look of informality?EUR??,,????'??+and was not hindered by the talent and engineering creativity of the design team!

The cantilevered coping hides the two automatic pool covers. The spa with the Cemrock-built boulders frame two waterfalls, one pool side and one that is viewed from the dining room.

The water features are the most striking feature of the rear yard. They help to create, along with the plantings of 14 types of grasses and lush foliage, the restful vacation-like effect the client was hoping to create. The boulders, waterways, pool and spas are laid out respecting traditions of balanced asymmetry, compositional massing and 3:5:7 principles. Using these borrowed Japanese design techniques helped to bring together the disparate pieces into a peaceful, cohesive whole. All the water elements are laid out on this informal axis principle.

To the left in this photo stands the glass shower from the master bedroom surrounded by the man-made rock wall by Cemrock. Planting pockets with drip irrigation water bougainvillea, potato vines, ferns and morning glory. The semi-circular wall creates privacy and a tropical atmosphere for the glass shower.

The glass shower is enclosed with a manufactured rock wall with planting pockets that hold ferns, grasses, morning glory, jasmine and bougainvillea. The wall was designed to create privacy, letting the owner bathe in ?EUR??,,????'??the outdoors?EUR??,,????'??. The planted rock wall along with the boulders and rock outcroppings were created by a manufactured rock company (Cemrock) from out of state. They came for two weeks, built frames, laid conduits, placed concrete, textured the gunite and colored during that time. It was an impressive display of expertise and creativity with a medium that can be difficult even under the best of conditions.

Horsetail (Equisetum hyemale) and Japanese blood grass (Imperata cylindrica) help to soften the plantings while reinforcing the natural flowing lines of the pool/spa and fountain complex.

The owner was receptive to sustainability concepts by employing solar panels that are 60 percent of the pool surface and provide all of the summer?EUR??,,????'???s pool-heating needs.

The owner also embraced sustainable woods. The designers choose renewable Ipe hardwood for pieces of the arbors and for the decking boards that were used. Several areas on the side yards received bio-swales to cleanse rainwater and help irrigate additional plantings. When it was complete, the owner said, ?EUR??,,????'??So much thought and effort went into planning that I never knew it took so much effort and study to plant and create a garden!?EUR??,,????'??

The complete garden is not visible from one point, but is discovered and explored while walking the grounds. Mystery and surprise are important parts of the designer?EUR??,,????'???s recipe. With ballet dance and horse dressage in mind, the team strove to keep everything natural and easy, as if nothing is overly done. Now the owner is overjoyed, and has cancelled two vacations to stay home. The owner feels and believes that there?EUR??,,????'???s no more restful, rejuvenating and reaffirming place than his home garden.

Two below-grade pool covers are located at opposite ends of this irregularly shaped pool. To cover the pool, they move toward each other and meet midway to enclose the entire water surface.

Robert Mowat Associates

Robert Mowat is a graduate form Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with degrees in Landscape Architecture and Ornamental Horticulture. The firm won an ASLA award for the design at the Katherine Delmar Burke school in 1996 and was profiled in the book Contemporary Trends in Landscape Architecture by Steven Cantor. Park, recreational, home communities, land planning and estate residential design make up the bulk of the firm?EUR??,,????'???s work. Offices are located in San Francisco, Napa Valley and soon-to-be Walnut Creek, Calif.