Montecito Meadow

This Montecito Landscape design and installation was completed in 2017, however due to the fact that the garden and the house were destroyed in the Montecito Debris flow of January 9, 2018, I was hesitant to share it. No one was home at the time of the disaster, so there were no injuries, but I still didn’t feel right about posting it. The heartbreaking loss of home and property was too fresh. It has been over four years, and this was such a special garden, I decided it was time to share it. Though, this landscape never had the chance to fully mature, I think you can agree, that is was spectacular.

As the before photo shows, this started as a blank slate, well not quite, there was a massive dying lawn which was not beautiful. And, with drought being ever present, a large lawn was not a viable option. Plus, a big lawn just isn’t very interesting.

The new landscape design removed the lawn entirely. The formality of the house led us to constructing a formal pond with stone edging in which was placed a large fountain. The effect was magical and the sound of water mitigated any noise coming from the fairly busy street outside the gates.

Instead of planting a sod lawn around the pond, we came up with the idea of “The Montecito Meadow”. This is a drought-tolerant alternative to a traditional sod lawn consisting of low-growing ground covers that can be mowed like a traditional lawn or left to grow various heights. We used drought-tolerant plants including Santa Barbara Daisy, Falkia, Fescue, Nepeta and others. The effect being one of opulent greenery with pops of color here and there. The best part is that the more it is mowed the more dense it becomes.

Gravel paths meandered through the entire garden, past colorful garden beds full of roses, lavender, jasmine, rosemary and around the pond and meadow and through the woods, to a secret garden where we placed a bench from which you could oversee the rest of the garden. There were several garden benches placed in spots that afforded the best views. Pittosporum of various types were planted to ensure that spring fragrance of Montecito would be present (contrary to popular belief, the spring fragrance of Montecito comes from the ubiquitous planting of Pittosporum). Pittosporum is particularly fragrant in the evenings which may be why some think the lingering fragrance is night-blooming jasmine. But I digress.

At night, the garden came alive with lighting that illuminated the paths, pond and fountain, the arch in the hedge and allowed one to stroll through the garden at all hours taking in the glorious sights.

I will be forever grateful to the owners who allowed us to have our way with the place and for whom there may still remain a bit of loss associated with this glorious garden. We thank you for allowing us to share a peek into a garden that is no more, but that was a stroke of genius for a time.

This project is dedicated to those who lost homes, gardens and worst of all, lives in the disaster of January 9, 2018. We have helped many of them creating new gardens after the destruction and you wouldn’t know it by looking at it now, but Montecito rose from the ashes of that day. To all who went through that and to all who helped, thank you.

xo Lisa Cullen