Dry garden in Jávea
A failed lawn on a windy slope above the sea, replanted as a gravel garden of agave, grasses and sea lavender.
- Town
- Jávea
- Size
- 380 m²
- Finished
- On site
- Seven weeks
The garden
The previous owners had laid turf twice. Both times the salt wind and the August sun finished it by the end of the first summer, and the slope was washing down onto the road below.
We graded the slope into two shallow levels, held by low walls of local stone, and covered the soil with 8 cm of gravel. The planting is all coastal species: agave, sea lavender, helichrysum, and grasses that bend with the wind instead of breaking.
Drip lines ran for the first two summers. They are now off, and the garden lives on rain.
Before and after
Taken from the same corner of the garden, the week we started and the summer after.
We used to water the lawn every evening in July. The new garden gets a drip twice a week and has never looked better.
The first visit is free
An hour in your garden with Ingrid Halvorsen, our head of design. You keep the ideas and a rough price range.