A Tale of Two Styles
“Out of all the clients we’ve worked with, I would say the least common route that people take is to tear down the house they’re living in, rent and rebuild a new house [on the same lot],” says Joseph Richardson, a landscape architect based in Arlington.
But that’s exactly what Michael and Melinda Winn did to their 1950s home in McLean a few years ago. It makes sense when you consider that Michael owns Winn Design + Build, based in Falls Church. Major construction projects don’t faze him.
Once the original home was gone, the empty lot gave Richardson a chance to address the site’s topographical problem areas—including the steep slope that dominated the backyard, which he deftly wrangled with stone retaining walls. But the couple came up against another stumbling block that had nothing to do with drainage or permitting: blending their two very different style sensibilities into one perfect family sanctuary.
“We always say, at least in my industry…that every degree in architecture should come with a minor in marriage counseling,” jokes Michael. “I think that’s probably true for Joseph and his field, because there’s a little bit of trying to play the counselor and trying to find a good, happy place.”
Richardson’s diplomatic challenge was to mingle Michael’s love of symmetry and structure with Melinda’s desire for elements that reflect her Korean heritage. The solution: a relaxed zen garden that serves as a bridge between a more structured dining area at one end of the backyard and an outdoor fireplace at the other end. From inside the house, this connective stretch of pavers and organic plantings becomes a focal point, providing beautiful views from the living room.
“I think the moment we unveiled that concept, everyone was like, ‘Oh, wow! Well, this is it. We’re all happy,’ ” Richardson says. “A big part of that was [considering] how do these spaces interact? Do they flow, and does everyone feel like their preferences and goals have been appreciated?”
Since the onset of the pandemic, Michael says his family has used some of those outdoor spaces more than ever. The loggia (a screened-in porch attached to the house) is where you’ll find him reading the paper on Sunday mornings. The leveled upper yard surrounded by stone walls is a prime spot for outdoor movie nights, thanks to a projector, and fierce family badminton tourneys.
Melinda gathers with girlfriends by the fireplace for socially distanced catch-up sessions, and the couple’s two young kids use it to toast marshmallows for s’mores.
In case you were wondering, Michael also got just about everything on his wish list—including his beloved symmetry.
“One of the features that I quite like is that you could draw a completely straight line from the street to the back of the house, as you go up the main [steps], through the front door, down the hallway, out the back door, through the loggia and up another set of stairs and through the hardscaping, and it’s all perfectly laid out,” he says. “It seems very orderly, which I appreciate.”
Pizzas in Paradise
Amy and Karl Williams use their lush, European courtyard-inspired patio year-round for gatherings with friends, family dinners, cocktails at Thanksgiving and even to curl up by the fireplace with blankets on mild Christmas days. Yet, ironically, Amy says one of her favorite things about the outdoor space is how much she enjoys seeing it from inside their twice-renovated 1930s Aurora Hills home.
“I love how it looks when I’m in my house, because we have a lot of windows and doors,” she says. “I’m constantly using the stairs—and with all those windows, every time I look down, it’s just so pretty to look at.”
Her husband, a keen home cook, would probably say his favorite part of the upgraded space is the built-in pizza oven—or maybe the Kalamazoo grill, which Amy calls “the Ferrari of grills,” or the smoker that can be controlled with a cellphone, or the fact that the outdoor kitchen was designed to make sure Karl was never left out of the fun.
“While he’s cooking, he’s very much part of the entertainment space,” says landscape architect Susanne Fyffe, who designed the backyard oasis. “Everybody at the bar is drinking and talking, and you’re all interacting with ease, which was the point. I wanted to make sure the grill wasn’t off to the side, and he’s standing there by himself cooking. He’s right in the thick of things.”
As a longtime neighbor and one of Amy’s closest friends, Fyffe had her eye on the backyard for years before she got the opportunity to give it a makeover.
“They love to cook and entertain, and it was a very small, awkwardly shaped space,” she says. “They wanted it to feel like a little Italian garden and be able to entertain a lot of people and be cozy at the same time.”
To help create that vibe, Fyffe installed a fountain, a concrete dining table that seats 12 (and doubles as a pingpong table) and a pergola outfitted with a hanging lantern, plus what Fyffe calls “mini spotlights to put a glow on the table.”
Next to that is a lounge area in front of a stone fireplace and pizza hearth, complete with a nook for wood storage, Old World-inspired sconces, two refrigerator drawers, a smoker and a rustic wooden mantel.
On the dining terrace, Fyffe surrounded a bed of gravel with a band of bluestone, giving the effect of a rug. For plantings, she chose skip laurels, emerald-green arborvitae and Chindo viburnum to provide screening for the couple’s mostly shady yard, along with plenty of hydrangeas. Amy says she and Karl both love gardening, too, so at least that part of the upkeep is fun.
“Our neighborhood is super, super tight, and we have tons of friends, and we have been able to use it for get-togethers during Covid,” says Amy. “It feels like you’re not in Arlington. It could feel European, or it could even feel like California.”
Garden Party
When a couple likes to garden and cook as much as Hunt and Alison Shipman do, it’s only natural that they start dreaming of a backyard retreat. In 2016, with one daughter in college and two high-school-age kids at home, the Shipmans were finally ready to add an outdoor kitchen, a loungy fireplace area and a tree-lined walkway to the rear of their Falls Church home. They settled on working with Arlington-based landscape architect Jennifer Horn and had zero regrets.
“She has good ideas, she listened to us, and I think she had a way to share her experience,” says Hunt, “that didn’t feel like she was pushing us to do one thing or not do something. But we got there on our own, anyway.”
For instance, the Shipmans came into the project thinking they wanted some sort of hot tub, splash pool or plunge pool. After meeting with Horn a few times, they realized they would be better off without it—a decision they now know was the right one because of cost and maintenance.
To fully capture everything else on their wish list, Horn created a large deck outfitted with a grill, a built-in Big Green Egg smoker, a searing station and a louvered pergola overhead so that the cooking and entertaining doesn’t have to stop if a light rain rolls in. That outdoor culinary zone gets used year-round.
“I’m the usual cook, and Hunt’s the weekend cook,” Alison says. “He likes the projects, and I like the 30-minute meal kinds of things.”
Horn used bluestone pavers to build the dining and fireplace areas, and to line walkways. Native serviceberry trees—a pollinator favorite—create an allée that guides guests from the driveway around to the back of the house. That pretty lined path has since morphed into a favorite family spot for photos on special occasions like homecoming, prom and graduation.
“You know, ultimately it was a pathway to get from the front yard to the backyard,” says Horn, “but it’s become something more like a family tradition for pictures now, which is really sweet.”
Since Hunt is an avid gardener, the yard already featured plantings and raised garden beds. To complement the existing landscaping, Horn added aromatics around the patio, and was able to transplant some flowers and shrubs she had removed during a revamp of the front yard. “They were definitely interested in herbs and having edible plants when possible, so we did use some rosemary, even Russian sage and lavender,” Horn says.
Careful consideration was given to the landscaping by the fireplace. “We used red twig dogwood there,” she explains, “because we know that the red stems on that bush are very pretty in the winter when you might be sitting out by the fire.”
In recent months, the Shipmans were especially grateful for their luxe backyard; it allowed them to safely entertain Alison’s parents and sisters, who live nearby.
“I like that it’s versatile,” Alison says. “There are kind of three separate spaces, so depending on how we’re entertaining, we can use either the lower patio by the fireplace, or the upper patio for drinks with friends—and obviously the kitchen area gets used year-round. Hunt loves the outdoor kitchen, and I think I love all of it.”
Water, Water Everywhere
All backyard renovations run into a few snags here and there, but some turn out to be far more challenging than others. For Lyon Village residents Josh Luszcz and his wife, Rebecca Pomarzynski, plans for a dream backyard were stymied when much of their budget ended up being diverted to deal with water issues.
“They were the lowest point in the neighborhood, so they were not only getting all of their own roof water, driveway water, etcetera, but all of the neighbors’ water was running off into their property,” says landscape designer Rob Groff, whose firm is based in Clarendon. “They basically had a swamp in the backyard. They could have done everything they wanted to do if it wasn’t for that.”
To mitigate the moisture, Groff’s team sunk permeable pipes into the ground to collect extra water from roof and patio runoff. The pipes are surrounded by gravel and topped with rock beds, which allows water to sit below the surface until it’s absorbed by the soil. Retaining walls, built to create flat terraces, also hide drainage fixes.
Given the constraints posed by the waterlogged site, the owners made some compromises to stay within budget.
“We left out a couple things that would [have made] the space more complete, like the fireplace and the pergola over the dining area,” says Luszcz, who bought the newly built home with Pomarzynski in 2018. They opted for concrete pavers (some of them designed to look like boardwalk planks) in lieu of more costly stone, and downsized the trees and shrubs, understanding that more mature plants come with heftier price tags.
“We don’t quite have the privacy we were envisioning because we have to let the plants grow,” Luszcz says.
Groff selected native plants wherever possible, such as inkberry holly and river birch, both known for performing well in wet conditions.
Water management wasn’t the only site challenge. The property’s triangle-shaped lot made the design solutions more limited, Groff says, as did municipal guidelines that restricted the small yard’s buildable space. Add to that an abundance of shady areas (which dry out slower than sunny ones) and the fact that the home has no back door; the only ways to access the backyard from the house are from doorways on either side.
“Normally, you’ve got this kitchen-to-patio connection, where you’re cooking, you’ve got a platter of food and you take it out to everyone. So that was definitely an obstacle,” says Groff. “We created these walkways on both sides of the house to make it as convenient as possible.”
Despite the challenges, Groff is pleased with the result. “This is probably one of the most complicated Arlington projects that we’ve ever worked on,” he says. “I think, at the end of the day, we turned a negative into a positive.”
Luszcz still considers the backyard a work in progress. He has his heart set on one day adding an outdoor fireplace, but for now is glad they got the detached storage shed they needed—a modern, prefabricated structure with bold red doors that he installed atop a foundation laid by Groff’s company.
Overall, he says he is extremely happy with Groff’s work. He loves the look of it, and the lighting in particular. “It looks really fantastic at night.”
Rina Rapuano is a freelance writer based in Washington, D.C., where she spends a good deal of time dreaming about someday having a backyard as lovely as these. Find her online at rinarapuano.com, on Instagram at @rinacucina and on Twitter at @rinarap.