New cup made by my friend Sam Clarckson from local Bonny Doon clay. Logo, of course, by my brother in law Jay.
slla
Lipscomb Associates
Landscape Architecture and Construction
Santa Cruz, California :: 831.621.7923
Oct 09
Apr 24
Just finished our latest…
Finished up over off of Meder St extension, and have the photographer coming next Friday. Kevin McElhinney built a beautiful Rumford fireplace and Tom Ralston provided some fantastic concrete finish work. Will update the website when I get better than Iphone photos. The project also included the construction of a barn for a solar electric array, a bunch of dry stacked retaining walls, and a steel and wood pergola.
Aug 15
August 12 2010, High Sierra.
May 20
The Bicycle Trip
I am very excited to be working with Berri Michel, a true visionary and the owner of the Bicycle Trip bicycle shop on the East side of Santa Cruz. The Bicycle Trip has recently decided to expand and is moving to a larger building down the street on Soquel Avenue, with an adjacent lot, which we are intending to develop into a bicycle and pedestrian friendly outdoor gathering space. Should be really great!
Apr 23
Check out the latest schematic design for a rather uniquely sited new house on the East side of Santa Cruz. I think that we are going to do something very interesting with the “lawn” which is actually going to be a very unique mix of traditional lawn grass and some different ornamental grasses of various types. The client is pretty sophisticated so I think that we may be able to do something different.
On another note, we have just picked up a contract to develop a site plan for the new Bicycle Trip. The Bicycle Trip folks have some very interesting ideas for what they would like to see in the new “parking lot”… We’ll keep you up to date.
Feb 02
Latest project February 2, 2009
Last month we finished or latest project, one that we began designing about this time last year, and one that SLLA also built, acting as the contractor for the job.
One of the very interesting things that we did was introduced permeable pavers for the 3500 square foot entry circle that made up the focus of the landscape design. The site lies within the ecologically sensitive Moore Creek watershed, so it was important that our project did not increase storm water runoff. To install the product, we over excavated the entry circle area 15 inches from grade, we used this soil to build up a planted portion of the site. We then filled and compacted the paver subgrade with different grades of drain rock, and put the permeable pavers on top. The pavers are absolutely beautiful and during a heavy rain storm, there is no water moving across the surface. Its amazing. The water is slowed significantly in the drain rock, and most, if not all, will percolate into the ground.
Other pieces to the project include a custom gate, a drought tolerant, and beautiful planting, including the addition of 8 large Canyon Live Oaks, as well as selection of both native, and exotic shrubs developed at the UCSC Arboretum, a well and distributed irrigation throughout the 3 acre site, and a night lighting system to provide ambience in the evening.
Photos in the project section coming soon!
Jun 17
June 14, 2008
We have been recently begun specifying irrigation controllers which adjust watering schedules based on evapotranspiration data. These clocks can significantly reduce water consumption, while actually increasing landscape health (by limiting over watering).
In January, we installed an ET control system for a client in order to achieve some water savings. We thought that we could achieve a pay back on the cost of the equipment and the cost of our services in 5 years. We are happy to report that we are looking like we will achieve full payback possibly within the year!
These clocks, which use either a subscription based ET data feed, or an onsite weather station for the data, are definitely looking like the future of irrigation control.
