Designing Natural Habitats and Food Systems

I believe in reclaiming spaces for natural wonder and curiosity

Designing natural spaces can be lower maintainance and better for the environment

After a trip to the UK, I came back feeling more inspired than ever to look at outdoor spaces as a place for contemplation and native beauty. I then went to work imagining what could be in a sea of 3’ weeds. Inspired by the contemplative stations found at many of the Catholic outdoor spaces in Ireland, I chose to minimize the maintanance of a yard and to carve pathways around future native and vegetable gardens. I also worked over the summer with a local organic farm. Through this, I was inspired to add a bit of hugelkultur and do soil remediation for the spring garden bed .

Native pollinator gardens offer 3 seasons of bloom and year round local environmental support.

The front of the house design was an effort to maximize pollinators and native plants to support the local wildlife as a native habitat. To that end, we sourced local plants from native nurseries and, after solarizing the grass (let’s be honest, really just weeds) and tilled the soil with supplemental nutrients, we arranged by height, time of bloom and color. My next project will aim to pair plants that are mutually beneficial to one another.