2008-02-13T20:08:00.000-08:00

Sheehan's Garden in October 2007 ....
House and Garden in West End, Brisbane, Australia
October 2007

..... 23 years on from when I designed and built their garden in 1984.
House overlooks the Brisbane River ....
..... The house was totally restored and rebuilt in many areas from a house that was originally built the late 1880's ..... very old for Brisbane ...
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...... View of the house in a side street

with purple flowered Clematis and other subtropical shrubs ....

.... The garden inside .... rainforest garden

drops to the river in terraces ...

..... The Blue Quandong tree .... a very rapidly growing rainforest tree ..... it was planted in 1984 at only 300 m high to screen out from the Sheehan's upstairs verandah view..... an unsightly adjacent roof ...

..... View from the top lawn terrace which overlooks

a lower deck terrace then the river
through some existing onsite trees .....

.... lower deck looks through an existing onsite tree
.... deck looks out on the river below .....

..... View of the Brisbane River from the

boat pontoon which goes out from the
river mangrove trees .....

.... View of the house from down in the garden

..... view through rainforest trees and Bangalow palms .....

.... A lower terrace garden walled by

a dry sandstone walling ..... I personally built
this wall with the help of employed labour ...

..... Flat sandstone slab steps going down

into the lower stone walled terrace ....

..... A big earthenware pot which the client has selected and
placed on an upturned concrete column ....
.... the handmade pot is an eye catching feature
amidst the natural growth of the garden ....

... lower deck terrace with a rectangular fishpond .....

.... lower deck terrace with dry
stacked sandstone wall ...
... it flows up to the top lawn terrace ...
..... see below .....

.... Front entry to the house with off

street gravel parking lot ...

Sheehan's Garden in October 2007 ....

.... 23 years on from when I designed and built their garden in 1984.

I was an artistic person, a lateral thinker ..... more artist than businessman. I thought of a landscape as a three-dimensional piece of space that people walked through. This space changed with time as it grew and changed with the time of day: shadows vs. sun patterns, boulders, colour, plants, trees, earth-forms, solid structures and water. These were the ingredients in a subtle flow of landscape design and construction. Rather an intangible product to sell and run a business with!! Out of this stage I built a structure for my life: my marriage with Harriet, business and the house plus we had a family.

See the website on the house at: http://kenandharrietshouse.blogspot.com

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Sheehan Garden Oct 2007