Complete Beginner Here - Retaining Wall Ideas

13 years ago

Hello! First let me start out by saying that I am completely new to landscaping, besides mowing grass and digging some holes here and there for various things! Anyhow, we have lived in our cozy home for about 6 years now and embarassingly enough I have not really done much to make it look nice outside. I mow and whatnot, but there is a lot of work to be done. I had not done anything because to be honest, we were not planning on living there too long, but looks like we are here at least for a while and have plans to remodel the inside and so I wanted the outside to look good as well. Plus I am looking for another hobby to do with the family (This would be me, my lovely wife, and three kids - 12, 11, and 3).

I have already started on a few small things, and I am sure you will all see me here frequently with many questions!

Let me also say that we are working with a small budget for the time being while my wife and I both finish our degrees and while I am the only one really working.

That being said, the first thing that I have a question about has to do with a very ugly retaining wall that I have to see every day. Our house is built into a hill and our house is actually lower in elevation than the road. When they built the house in 1943, they used a 4 foot tall retaining wall to hold back the street essentially. :)

It is plain concrete - flat and ugly and looks like a sidewalk stood up on its side! My first thought was to simply use rocks on the oustide of the wall to have a much better look. This would be a fine idea it is just we do not have the money to spend. I could do the work myself, but wanted to go another route that is cheaper. (Sorry I do not have any pictures by the way - I cannot seem to find any that I have taken of the ugly wall!).

So, I got to thinking, what are some other ideas I could use to fix up this wall? By the way, I had thought about shrubs in front, but that won't really work because our front yard is not that big and the kids use the front to play (the backyard is just one big hill) and I think that something like that would take up too much yard.

Although, if I used tall skinny types of shrubs or small trees, that might work?

What about some sort of plant that would crawl on it and eventually cover the ulgy cement? Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

Mike

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Comments (6)

ilikemud_2007
13 years ago
Hi Mike,

Pictures would be a huge help, so see if you can post some. You could grow a nice evergreen vine or even stucco that wall, but we also need more info. How much sun does the wall get? what is the style of your house? what is it sided with? You say the yard isn't very deep so it would make sense to me to coordinate the house and wall in some way.
lehua49
13 years ago
Hi Mike,

Find an artist who would do your wall for some beer. He could paint a garden mural with perspective. Maybe with some kids playing in the yard and add a dog. I hope your degrees are in the graphic arts or you can advertise at your university. What a class project for some energetic students. If it doesn't turn out well just paint it out with a train tunnel. Or maybe ivy would be nice. I like the stucco idea too. Aloha
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You are essentially looking to accomplish one goal. That is to reduce the pressure caused by the added weight of water being held by the soil behind your wall. Anything else that you do that does not contribute to that goal is meaningless. If you do the post hole method, it will do very little because it won't drain the surrounding soil. The only thing it will do is provide a path for surface water to follow out through the weep holes. That can help divert a certain amount of surface water out of the area before it has a chance to be absorbed by the soil. The water has to be flowing on the surface and directed directly into those columns of stone for that to happen. The stone is not going to pull it out of the soil and the soil is not going to give it up until it can't take any more. Until you correctly understand water movement in soil you can't address the problem effectively. Try this to help understand the situation. Fill an aquarium half way with dry sand and then top it off with soil. Tamp it down a bit with your hand making a slight depression in the middle. Slowly drip water into that depression and see how long it takes the sand to get wet. You will find that the soil will be entirely saturated before it drains into the sand. It is no different behind your wall. The soil is still going to load with water. Replace what you can of that soil behind the wall with a material that will not load and you will reduce the pressure on the wall. Weep holes or no weep holes, that will be the biggest way you can affect reducing pressure on that wall. I really don't think you have much of a problem with surface water. Your roof drains are piped away, the house foundation appears to be just a few feet away, and the return walls make it appear that there is a steeper slope parallel to those walls than perpendicular to them. That makes me think that it is unlikely that you have completely saturated soil behind that wall very often, if at all. If that is the case, trying to make the weep holes work is a waste of time.
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missingtheobvious
13 years ago
Hi, shelzmike. I'm glad to hear your wall is in good repair, as the alternative can get pretty expensive!

What's at the top of the wall? How do you feel about plants hanging down from the top?

How close is the wall to the street? Are there any state, county, or municipal regulations that say what can't be planted near the street? (I am also below the street, though my front yard is not so low as yours; I'm on a 2-lane, semi-rural state route and have to follow state guidelines about what can be planted within 5 and 20 feet on the downhill side of the road.)
wellspring
13 years ago
Shelzmike-
I've learned tons of things just reading threads on this forum , often just opening threads on topics I think won't have anything to do with anything I'd ever need in my landscape only to discover some useful hint or tidbit.

Try putting "retaining wall" in the search box on this forum. It'll get you 262 old threads. Some of it won't be relevant to your situation; but I think you will also come across general ideas and suggestions that will help. It may lead you to questions you haven't even thought about yet.

I know IÂve read "retaining wall" threads on the specific issues of homes with slope toward the house. The one below is recent. The home is in the mountains, but with the slope descending toward the back of the home and away from the front, if that makes sense. I didn't re-read, but I think there is also conversation about different ways to disguise the RWs.

Look forward to hearing more about your new adventure outside. Watch out though. the landscape design / gardening bug is very addictive.

Here is a link that might be useful: Two Bland Retaining Walls
lazy_gardens
13 years ago
Where do you live? Zone 7 isn't quite specific enough.

A combination of paint and some tallish plants will do.

If it faces south, east, or west, plant sunflowers in front of it, or hollyhocks.
silversword
13 years ago
I've seen them stuccoed and painted... pretty inexpensive and would bring a lot of color (or not) to your yard. Then any plantings over it or around it would have a nice backdrop.

Complete Beginner Here - Retaining Wall Ideas

Comments (6)

ilikemud_2007

lehua49

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