Turnkey project · park
Hillside park with a waterfall: water, stone and steps
A 50 × 70 m plot near Girona with a 6.5 m level change. Water rises at the top, falls in a cascade to a pond, and paths climb the slope to a lookout and a rotunda.
Demonstration project. Fictional plot and owners. We designed it to show how a sloping site is resolved: water, walls, steps and planting.
The brief
A site with a 6.5 m level change and a steep bank in the middle. The owners want to make use of it: water you can hear across the plot, comfortable paths to the top and places to sit. Before moving any earth they need to see how it all fits.
What we built
- Modelled terrain: a 6.55 m level change with a steep bank in the middle.
- A 23 m mountain stream from a spring with 13 riffles, and an 11.5 m waterfall of six 0.55 m steps falling into a 169 m², 1 m deep pond.
- A 33.6 m² lookout over the waterfall with a stone retaining wall, and three terraces totalling 128 m² on the east slope with stone walls up to 1.12 m.
- Four flights of steps, 46 steps in all: the main flight of 24 steps climbs 3.57 m.
- Eight path sections, 123.4 m: a cobbled walk, a zigzag flagstone path and gravel paths at the top.
- A columned rotunda at the top, a 3.6 m bridge over the stream by the waterfall, ten benches, twelve lamps and 59 boulders.
- 54 trees: stone pine, Atlas cedar, cypress, yew, holm oak, oak, alder, weeping willow, Japanese maples, ginkgo, sweetgum, Judas tree and tree ferns.
- 637 shrubs and perennials, each one its own species: ferns, sedges, irises, callas and rushes by the water; sage, lavender, rockrose, myrtle and bay in the sunny areas.
What the owners gain
The owners walk the slope before any earth is moved: they see where the water runs, how many steps lead to the lookout and what can be seen from each bench.
Technology
Our own 3D garden design software: terrain and earthworks, retaining walls, steps, streams and waterfalls, species with their growth, sun by location and date, camera paths and video recorded by the software itself.