Hillside Garden
Large rocks are often used to hold back dirt on hillsides and create level areas for planting but they are expensive to buy and put in place. I thought large pots would work just as well and be interesting to look at. But I needed more retaining power to support a walkway looping through the garden so I designed a system of pots and short walls. The walls are made of old split-rail redwood my neighbor nabbed from a curbside, destined for the dump and held in place with wood posts sunk into the ground. I used just one post per wall segment, placed in the middle of the wall and lag screwed each rail to the post.
This photo was taken between winter and spring when little foliage exists to hide the walls and pots.
A closer look. The path runs just above the line created by the blue and terra cotta and green pots.
This shows how I angle cut the ends of the rails so the pots could nestle into them. The walls are only about a foot or 15 inches high.
The top step is cut to accommodate the pot. At the right, I built a bench of old redwood to sit on top of a short cinder block retaining wall to add height to the wall. The back of the bench serves as a retaining wall of sorts, though there's really not much dirt back there. I bolted the bench down with concrete anchors. Pots were sitting on the bench, which I contoured to fit a human body, when this photo was taken.