Landscape Architect Articles

Real, Big, Retaining Walls01-18-16 | News

Real, Big, Retaining Walls
Create Functional Walls that are Beautifully Organic, and a Little Bit Different

By Melissa Johnson, Rosetta Hardscapes

Shea Homes' Stepping Stone development in Parker, Colo., needed a unique, functional landscape design. The solution was a series of retaining walls, designed by Sage Design Group and installed by R&S Retaining Walls. Throughout the new single-family development, 33 retaining walls totaling 17,000 square feet have been installed so far.

Shea Homes Colorado and Sage Design Group knew exactly what they wanted in landscaping design for Stepping Stone, a modern, single family home development in Parker, Colo.

Sage and Shea Homes hoped that they could use color to make the community open spaces as fresh, welcoming and attractive as possible. All of these unique specifications presented the developers of Stepping Stone with an exciting challenge: how to create functional walls that are beautifully organic, and a little bit different, without breaking the bank.

Phil Sage of Sage Design Group worked with Shea Homes and landscape contractor Rod Rucker of R&S Retaining Walls to create a unique aesthetic. Instead of traditional rectilinear walls, the 33 retaining walls curve and are two-sided. While the varying curves would mean a lot of calculations, the stones selected for the project come in a variety of sizes, including face widths as small as 4". Because of the size variance, Rucker and his crew found the curved installation as easy and as natural as a straight installation.

The Challenge
Phil Sage, founder of Sage Design Group and lead designer for the project explained, "We wanted to do things a little bit differently than what you'd find in a standard subdivision." The key element in providing distinction and aesthetic was a series of retaining walls - 33 retaining walls, to be exact.

"Instead of just having straight rectilinear walls like you would see in most walls in developments, we wanted to make it quite a bit more artistic, with everything much more organic," explained Sage. But these walls needed to do more than look visually appealing. "What we ended up creating was a retaining wall that's fluid, but also two sided. That helped us get the height up, and helped with visual and sound attenuation from the nearby highway."

Ultimately, the retaining walls had to make the community fresh and welcoming, support the land, and shield the homes from highway sights and sounds, all while staying within budget.

No two walls are exactly alike, and the nonlinear design gave Rucker and Sage more freedom to use varying heights as visual and auditory barriers from the nearby highway. The surrounding landscape includes drought-tolerant plantings in rocks.

The Solution
The solution came from landscape contractor and retaining wall specialist Rod Rucker of R&S Retaining Walls. Rucker introduced the design team to wet cast concrete products being made by Basalite in Denver. With their help, Sage and Shea Homes decided that Rosetta's Belvedere line of freestanding and retaining wall blocks would suit their needs exactly.

The original intent of the design was to build the retaining walls using natural stone. However, as operations manager Joe Kerrigan, P.E., reasoned, "those retaining walls were going to cost them an arm and a leg." The Belvedere stones proved to be an effective alternative. Sage said it this way; "By the way it installs, it creates a lot of shadow effect, helping to make it feel more natural. It's a lot more visually interesting when you see those lines that are random, as opposed to a lot of product out there which sits straight across, feeling very manmade."

The installation of Phase I started in June 2015 and took a crew of five around six months to complete. Phase I covered 17,000 square feet; Phase II is slated to be completed in spring 2016 and covers 15,000 square feet. The installation began with a solid block base, and proved to be fairly easy work thanks to the consistent dimensions of Rosetta's Belvedere wet cast concrete wall blocks. The team did not need a pattern to place the blocks.

The collection includes a hand set line of wet cast concrete wall products. Multiple unit sizes, along with unique stone textures give the blocks a natural look. Corresponding dimensional coping options and column caps are available.

As most wall contractors are well aware, in a typical serpentine retaining wall made of wedge shaped blocks, blocks must be set according to a minimum radius (typically no smaller than 60") and cutting the blocks often becomes necessary to accommodate tight corners. This might have been especially true for the Stepping Stone project in light of the expansive heights of some of the walls. What's more, the contractors on the project were tasked with building a lot of very different curves. All of this might have meant a whole lot of calculations, block cutting, offset joints and time.

However, because of the varied sizes of the Belvedere block, including unit face widths as small as 4", Rod Rucker and his crew from R&S Retaining Walls found building curved walls for the Stepping Stone project as easy as building straight walls. Even curves designed to be tighter than normal could be completed with minimal cutting. And when finished, the Belvedere curves looked natural instead of contrived.

To complete the aesthetic charm of these open spaces, Kerrigan created a custom color to coordinate with the other elements of Sage's design. The color, called 'Stepping Stone' after the development, is one of the darkest custom colors created by Kerrigan. The dark color was chosen to contrast with the natural colors of the site and to emulate natural stone.

The installation of Phase I, which was 17,000 square feet, took a five-person crew nearly six months to complete in phases and began with a solid block base. The team didn't need to reference a pattern to construct the walls, which range from 3'-10' tall.

Joe Kerrigan, P.E., operations manager for Basalite, created a custom color for the project called 'Stepping Stone,' which was named after the development. The color is one of the darkest Kerrigan has created. It was designed to emulate natural stone in a convincing way, and to contrast with the natural colors of the site. The walls range from 3'-10' high and are surrounded by complementing drought-tolerant landscaping.

The Outcome
The collection's two sided, authentic stone texture and size offered the development the desired function and finish for each type of wall and every application. Kerrigan and Rucker were able to meet the design team's exact needs with precision and excellence, minus the excessive costs and complications of quarried stone.

The finished project for Stepping Stone was beautiful and affordable, and the versatility of the wall blocks meant a simple and dependable installation, wall after wall. And, 17,000 square feet of retaining wall later, Sage added, "We wound up getting a look that was a little bit different than what we started with, but at the end of the day, it is so unique. It is so different than anything else I've seen out there today."

Project Team:
Landscape Contractor: Rod Rucker, R&S Retaining Walls
Project Engineer and Manufacturer: Joe Kerrigan, P.E., Basalite
Project designer: Phil Sage, Sage Design Group
Project developer: Shea Homes in Colorado