We’re Back at Shelley’s Garden — It’s Front Yard Makeover Time!

Welcome, gardeners! In today’s video, I’m back at Shelley’s beautiful hillside garden — but this time, I’m joined by my friend and landscape designer Michael Glassman! Ten years ago, Michael helped Shelley design her charming backyard, and now it’s time to give the front garden the same thoughtful touch. Together, we walk through Michael’s plans to transform the space into something beautiful, functional, and truly show-stopping. If you love classic garden style with personality and purpose, you won’t want to miss this one! 🌳 Enjoy!

Watch my original tour of Shelley’s garden here!: https://youtu.be/u1JN5BF3t08

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[Music] Hi everyone, Janie here. Welcome back. And welcome back, Michael Glassman. Greetings. It’s always a pleasure to be here. I always love it when you’re on the channel. It’s It’s such a fun day for me. So, we are actually revisiting a garden that I did a garden tour of just a couple weeks ago. This is Shel’s garden. She lives in Elorado Hills and this was the grandma core garden which I know you all were just as obsessed with this garden as I was. And it was such a joy to find out that you actually designed this garden. How long ago? Oh, 10 years. 10 years ago. Yeah. A long time ago. I mean, it’s just so fabulous. And so, we were here for another reason. You’ll know in a second. But I just want to get your take on the backyard and then we’ll show you guys what we’re really doing here. And it’s been 10 years. And I have to say that the transformation of this yard is amazing. And I just kind of wanted to give you the reason we did certain things. One of the things about design that we talk about is function. And when I originally came here, they did not they had a teeny little deck here and you came out the door and you literally fell out of the fell down the deck. Yeah. So the very first thing that we talked about was coming from the back door out to a lot much larger space. And I loved the idea. And the idea was we’re leaving the oaks. We weren’t going to cut the oaks. So that when you’re up on this stick, you almost feel like you’re in a treehouse. It really does. It really does. This is such a magical magical place. And I can see that you’ve worked around the existing nature that was here. Exactly. And a lot of times, and this will help some of your viewers, a lot of times people what they do is like I’ll come out and do a consultation and you come out of the house and they have this incredible view and they say, “Well, what should we do down below?” Yeah. And it’s not that we’re not going to talk about down below, but your view is here. I mean, this is a million-dollar view. Look at that. I would never want to not see this view. I know. So, to be able to come out here, have a dining table, be able to sit here and just stare at the view is just amazing. You needed more space. You needed more space. It needed to be level. It need to have railings so that you don’t fall off the deck. I love it. And then what’s wonderful about it is even if you don’t go down below, you’ve got an area that people can congregate and it’s this indooroutdoor environment and that’s what I love about it. Then I knew that they wanted to do cooking. So we designed this lower area for the outdoor kitchen. And the thing that’s really neat about this is it’s not like you’re sitting on the driveway where no one can see you, right? People can be up there. Yes. You can talk to the person that’s cooking. They’ve got the smoker so that the smoke doesn’t go into the house. I love it. You can be sitting at the dining table holding a conversation. Very funny story. Yeah. When in our last house before we did this, I had redone, this was before I got married, I had redone my wife’s place. She doesn’t cook. I do all the cooking. Yeah. Anyway, and so I designed this whole courtyard. Gorgeous. Won an award. It was beautiful. But because she didn’t cook, there was not an outdoor kitchen. When we lived lived in that house together, um I was barbecuing every day and making I was sitting on the driveway. Go. So everyone would be in the courtyard having this grand time. I was out on the driveway barbecuing and then I’d open the gate. What are you guys doing in there? Exactly. I always felt like, oh my god, no. You know, it’s like throw something. Throw a bone to it. A but this is what’s so neat about this is this makes you part of the entertainment and you know I mean let’s be let’s face it when people entertain especially in the kitchen people like to stand around and talk to the cook. Yeah. Um and that’s why the whole idea of the open concept everyone is now sitting at the kitchen. When you’re here on the upper deck and you’re looking at this incredible view you still can talk to the person that’s doing the cooking and it’s not that far. You can even set things out there and then bring it up to be able to eat here. And I also love that you didn’t put the kitchen up there so that it wasn’t actually taking up this the living space. It just kind of doubled the amount of space they had up there, but you still incorporated the kitchen. Exactly. And I have to say what is so wonderful is Shel’s use of like the succulents and the pots and everything. Isn’t she good? Yes, she’s very good. And it’s filming right now. Yes. And I also know, you know, I see this little I know Margaret Hudson. Yeah. Very, very cute. And for people that don’t understand, this is quartzite. It’s an outdoor material. It’s not quartz. Quartz is great for indoors, but it can’t take the outdoor environment. Quartzite is a natural stone and you leave it outside and it can take the hot and the cold. It can take the rain. And all you do is just clean it up and it looks beautiful. I am so glad that you’re here going over this garden with us because this was such a hit on the channel. Everybody loved loved this garden and everyone loved Shel’s little additions to the garden. It was so much fun. But you set the foundation, right? And it’s really important to think the thing that you have taught me with all of our time together is that you have to think about the foundation. You have to think about the function first. And I think that that is so important and I hope that we’re getting that across right in these videos is to think about this type think about the things because unlike some areas of the country where you don’t spend a lot of time, we’re in California and the weather is wonderful. I mean this week, yes, we’re going to get some a little bit of rain, but it’s going to be still we’re in the winter. It’s still so nice. So we’re going to be out here and again what is so amazing about this property, gorgeous oak trees, incredible view. Why not be able to sit out here as long as you possibly can and enjoy it? I love it. So then the last thing as we go down was they wanted a swimming pool. Yes. And the pool. We weren’t going to take out any oak trees. We weren’t going to And you know for people, one of the things that’s really important is pools are great. When it’s 105, you need a swimming pool, but there’s a big expense for them. Yes. And you can only really use a swimming pool probably four or five months out of the year at the most. So we actually put the pool out here where it gets the maximum amount of sun. Pushed it out. So you will notice that there is a retaining wall here, a seat wall that was designed. Oh, I love that. So that again you don’t fall down the hill. And of course it is fenced here. Yeah. The the the I love the white iceberg roses. I mean, it’s November and they’re still blooming. Look at how gorgeous this is. They are absolutely gorgeous. Beat this. This is so great. And you can get out of the pool and again, just what you’re doing is sit on the seat wall, talk to people that are swimming. I mean, without having to put a lot of furniture here, you’ve got extra seating area. And then again, looking back to the deck, it’s gorgeous. Having the Aelas, having the the welded wire mesh with a vine on there so you’re not looking completely underneath the deck. It creates this wonderful space of levels. I just absolutely love it so much and I love that you did. I didn’t know you did this garden. I didn’t know when I met Shel. I didn’t know. And then like in as we were talking she’s like, “Oh yeah, Michael Glassman did it.” What? Like what? So let’s talk about the reason why we’re here today. Okay. So like with any project and people do things on a budget and this is what I tell people. That’s the advice I gave you. If you have a limited budget, if you have limited resources, take one area, develop it, finish it, move on to the next area. So their backyard, the upper deck, the sitting area over here, that was their priority. Gorgeous. But then there’s a front yard. Oh, yes. And the front yard had some indigenous problems that we We haven’t shown you guys the front yard yet on purpose, but you are taking that project on. We’re taking that project on and we’re doing the front yard now. Now that resources are available now that it’s that they’ve already finished the back. Now they’re so annoyed with the front yard. Say that. They’re so annoyed. They want to do something about it. Let’s head to the front yard and you can see what they’ve got going on there and then what your plans are. Perfect. All right. So we are in the front yard now. You all have not seen the front yard yet and there’s a reason for that. So when I came and Shelley said come and do a consultation and give me some ideas for the front for the front. Yeah. Um back was already done. And there are certain indigenous problems that we have to deal with. Really? Yes. Number one is it’s hot. Number two it’s it’s down a hill. It’s extremely steep. Super steep. Very steep. Drainage is an issue that you have to cover. Two of the most gorgeous big redwood trees, but we all know about redwood trees. We all know about redwood trees. And it they also have an oak. And they used to have a walkway that was so treacherous. Yeah. That when my administrative assistant, Jod, came Yeah. Um she had hurt her knee and she couldn’t even get to the front door because she couldn’t get down the steps. Poor Jodie. Poor Jodie. So, the first thing I said to Shelley was, um, that old walkway’s got to go away. Yeah, we need to make something a lot bigger, a lot wider, a lot more interesting. And so you can see the contractor’s already been here. So these are new. These are just installed. A new walkway. These are amazing. These look so good. And it’s interesting because they’re staggered. So it doesn’t look like a big big runway of steps, but you still can walk down the center so you’re not going back and forth bouncing around. I love that. But visually you have something more interesting to look at it. And I saw this garden before these steps were here and I I think I went down cuz you know you always talk about desire paths and you know what I mean and so I didn’t know where to go. So I ended up going down that way but it was super super steep. Even I was uncomfortable right and I have to tell you if it’s raining or though the driveway is wet and you try to go down there you break your neck. can wind up just falling down and winding up in the garage. So Shel, how do you like us just like Yeah. So the reality is garden sucked. Yeah. So the reality is again it’s it’s a matter of and I know reading some of the comments of your of your subscribers, they love to see a project as it’s being developed. Oh yes. But part of when you’re designing is to analyze the problems. It doesn’t matter. You can put beautiful plants and flowers or anything. If you don’t solve your problems, if you don’t solve the drainage, you don’t solve the the the function the pathways, you’re spending money and you might as well just flush it down the toilet. Yeah. And that’s you’re so good at that. Like I was saying, like the function, you have to set the structure first before you add the other stuff. And I personally don’t think about the structure. I just want the pretty stuff. See, and I immediately my first thing is problem solving. How can I solve the problem so someone doesn’t go flying down the driveway? How can I get to the front door? How can I make the front door inviting? Yes. So again, one of the things you can see down there, we made the walkway a lot wider so that you are invited to go to the front door. Yeah. Now, a lot of people are saying, “Well, what are you going to do? What are some of the new things?” Well, up here, it was the one area that gets full sun. You’re not competing with the redwood trees. So, we decided to do a raised natural stone planter in here and which will be it’s only going to be raised 12 to 18 in new soil in here and make this kind of a focal point. And what we talked about was maybe doing I was talking to Shel and she loves the vitex. Yes. A vitex maybe in the center do some really cool grasses. Lamandra, Platinum Beauty, Lamandra, Breeze, maybe then do some color, some of the salvia because one of the other problems that again a lot of people don’t have to deal with, they have a major deer infestation. It’s not like one or two deer kind of like a whole herd. We saw a picture. Yeah. Yeah. We saw a picture of it just the other day. I mean, they get like five, six, seven whole herds come through here. Wow. So, you have to pick plants that are deer resistant. Now, they may munch on it initially and then they’ll leave it alone. So, again, a vitex would be great. The grasses, they hate the grasses. Salvia they’ll leave alone. She could even put a little bit of trailing lant uh trailing um rosemary. Oh, pretty rose, which would be real pretty. And then, so hold on. So, the raised bed here, is that also because of the redwood trees? It’s also it’s away from the redwood so you don’t have to worry about as much having the nutrients stolen but at the same time I wanted something a little bit higher to give some drama. Got it. And we’re going to do another raised planter on the other side of the driveway so that there’s some symmetry. Love that. But we’re doing something out of rock so that again when you look at this the rock that’s on the house the naturalness of the redwoods so that we’re keeping this very organic look. It’s not a form. There’s no formality. Right. And Shel loves Shel. You love that livedin look. Look here for years. That’s her style. And then now what we’re going to do is so here’s here’s a problem that you have to address. Okay. I love the staggered things and and a lot of people would say, “Well, what are you going to plant along here?” The problem that you’re going to run into is so come down here so we can look at it from up. The problem that you’re dealing with is besides we’re putting lighting in here, we’re going to do some really cool Kitler lights so it doesn’t look like spaceships that landed here. But the thing about this is because of the redwood trees, anything you put directly into the ground, they’re not going to grow, right? The between the roots of the redwoods and the nutrients that that the redwood is taking, it’s not going to grow. And and you can already see Shel’s a wonderful gardener, right? But we can already see some of our salvia is kind of struggling a little bit. And it’s not Shel’s fault. It’s the fault of the redwood trees. So if Exactly. So people I get this all the time. They have these big established trees and they go, “Well, I want to plant something under it, but every time thing that I’ve planted dies.” And it’s because the tree is shading it out. There’s root systems, but they’re also stealing all the nutrients. Yeah. So it’s not your fault, Shel. So, my solution has always been if you want something underneath the trees, you do these self-contained planters. Drip irrigate them, put new soil in them. They’re not getting the nutrients stolen from the tree, and you can kind of change it out. So, what we’re going to do, we’re not going to line this. We’re going to stagger these court and steel. They’re rusted planters. We’re going to stagger maybe five to seven of them. They’re going to be staggered here along on these some of the insets and then planted out with things like um asparagus ferns la or liop and then she can throw for color she could put like um cyclamin in the spring impatience would do so well beautiful kolas I mean again these are things kolus that would be really pretty and the deer will leave most of this alone and then what would so would they be square planters they’re going to be square planters and they’re going to They’re not going to be lined up other than maybe two will line up on either side, okay, to frame, but they’re going to be staggered. So again, the whole thing isn’t going to be lined with planners. That would be too much. But they’ll be staggered. Love that. So again, very organic, very or very artistic. Yeah. And again, working and solving the problems that are here. One, you had to have steps to get down. Like you you there’s just no other way to get from one point A to point B. And so by softening it with these staggered steps is fabulous. Two, we can’t grow anything underneath a redwood tree, so raise beds. So you’re just solving the problems, which is great. And we have to have lighting because otherwise at night someone’s going to break their neck and you know, and sue Shelly and her husband. And the lights, the old lights used to look like spaceships. Yes. These are kind of an arm and and we’ll take a picture of it and show you what Yeah. They’re really pretty. And they’re just going to kind of fade away. You know what I mean? So now we get down here and the idea being is she has a breakfast nook there and the front door is glass. So right about here I had suggested and she loved the idea of putting a piece of stone like a little monolith fountain. Love it. A natural stone that matches their existing bubbler a basin that would be sunk into the ground rock around it and that will be because one of the things that they have is they have a drainage problem. Yeah. This is a hillside. All the water goes down towards the house. So all along here is going to be, you can see the pipes are already started is going to be drainage, but instead of it just being a bunch of area drains, we’re making this into a dry creek bed. I love that so much. And because here in California, when we get rain, we get rain. We get rain. We don’t get like a little bit. It’s like boom, rain. So you can imagine it’s all coming down. The amount of water coming down. So, what we’re going to do is we’re going to have area drains underneath the rock and everything. French drains here. And so, what’s going to happen is there’ll be a light on this fountain. So, you’ll be able to see it from the breakfast nook. And you can see it right from the breakfast nook, which is amazing. And then it’ll look like it doesn’t, but it’ll look like it flows into the dry creek bed. I love that. And then lighting. What I was suggesting to the contractor is a few lights in the dry creek bed so that at night if this is trickling, you’ll have the illusion that the water It’s like your place. will be flowing through the dry creek. Did you see my new lights in the dry creek bed? I love it. They look so good. Oh my gosh, they look so good. And then what I told Shel and she loved that idea because again I I watch your videos. Um well, the privet is coming out. That’s just a weed tree. But what we’re going to put in its place a flamethrower, a Cersus flamethrower, red bud. It’s also deer retardant re resistant. We’re going to put it there because that’s your focal point. that we’re going to take out the privets over there and we’re going to put one a little further back. We’re going to put one multi- stem our bututus merina. It’s a it’s a variety of strawberry tree and it’s evergreen. It’s evergreen and it has red peely bark love which and it’s a multi- stem. It’s not a single tree. We don’t want to compete with the oak because the oak stain. The oak oak is definitely staying and we’re going to have the multi- stem arbutus and that’s more of a dwarf. And then we’re going to put a wooden wire panel along there because that’s a neighbor’s I know you can see right in the neighbor’s house, right? You don’t want to look at the neighbor’s car. So that’ll be like the back the wooden wire fence with a vine on it. She can do a honeysuckle or a jasmine. Oh, I love that. Oh, I just absolutely love that. And then all along here, what we’re going to do is along the dry creek bed, taking out the boxwood, too formal. Yeah. And we’re going to do cape rush. Yes. And we’re going to do asparagus ferns. Laia. make this much more organic and natural. I love that. Same thing on this side. And then she’s got an owl that you I didn’t even know. I thought that was a cat. Can you focus on the owl? It’s so cute. We’re Everyone’s making fun of the owl. It’s so funny. But it’s definitely a owl. I Right. And what we’re going to do was calling it a cat. I thought it was a cat. And we’re going to move the owl to underneath the flamethrower. Put it on a pedestal with a light on it so that you actually get a chance to see. They’re going to make it actually a piece of art, right? Which is really instead of an after. So, talk about how the dry creek bed is going to go look like it’s going underneath. Well, in reality, and she can show a picture, there is a pipe that goes that you can see is already underneath the poured concrete. And so, the dry creek bed in reality, the water will flow through the pipe, come down here. So, it’ll look like the fountain overflows into the dry creek bed. The dry creek bed goes underneath the walkway, which in reality it will, right? And then the water will come along here and at the end of this is a big catch basin. I love it. And then the water disappears and go. I love that. That is so cute. And we can again along here do some of the more natural grasses. And then all of this is coming out. We want to make this more of a showplace. So the pitisporum comes out, the boxwoods come out. We’re thinking maybe a serpentine cedar right in the center of course. Of course. Or I years ago I used to use their weeping Tulsson’s weeping junipers. You were telling me about that. I love those. I forgot about those. So that might be another thing. And then maybe accent him with two weeping red butt on either side. Okay. Just do the grasses. Do the the I love the cousinit plant with over here. The acacia. Yeah, the acacia cousinit. And then what I want to do is dot along the wall. Not a solid, but dot in some nandina gulfream. gorgeous, which will be orange, will kind of have the rust color along there. And then this area again, a few more asparagus ferns. Um, making this grasses the cousin it the the acacia, the um the nandina gulfream, the weeping red buds. I would do the traveler, which is the dark green. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then we either do a serpentine cedar here or we do the Tlsson’s sweeping juniper. Beautiful. which again keeps this very organic feel. Yes. And I love the juxtaposition of the grasses with the asparagus fern, the laapi, the um uh landra with the the redwood trees. I think that that will counteract the redwood trees really really beautifully. Absolutely. And there’s not going to be it’s not going to be an overabundance like you can see you can’t get plants along there, but you can put some rock along there so you don’t have to worry about it. Yeah. And the big thing is is why fight that you’re never going to win? I love that. I mean, you know, at a certain time you capitulate and say, “I not going to win. Why am I Why am I fighting it?” So, you concentrate on the things that you know you can win. You make it a wow. And I will tell you when this is done, this will be a wow. It will be stunning. So, what’s going to go like over like here? So, she’s got a choice. I would either do River Rock, okay? Different size river rock. So there’d be 6 in, 3 in, 2 in, or she could just keep it in a mulch. I Yeah, because the reality is it’s not going to grow. We could try a ground cover, but it’s not going to grow. And it looks like mulch is supposed to be here. You know what I mean? It looks like No. And you get this, you get all the leaf drop here. And my feeling is is if they like the idea of the river rock, they don’t put it right up against the trunk. But then if you’re going to clean out some of the old leaves, you just blow it out. or in my case, which is something that that Shel has to deal with here because she has so many trees in the fall. There’s it’s definitely a leaf cleanup garden. So, Michael Glassman would instead of using a blower, you know, would use his big shop back and would be vacuuming the front yard. I started taking my vacuum outside. Do you love it? I mean, it’s I feel so strange, but I I feel like I’m Michael. Like, I do I I do my patio. I do my beds. I mean, I’m I know I’m anal, but you know what? It’s the funniest thing. Yeah. I mean, I do you, Michael. Only only anal people like myself will actually vacuum their backyard, vacuum the Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I love that. But I get the biggest most powerful shop back. What I did was I got three extra filters. So, if I burn out one filter, you’re good. But, I mean, it doesn’t push all of that that dust into the air and you don’t have all the leaves flying around. They’re all sucked up. There’s something so sad. So, we will we will come back. Shel’s getting it done. The contractor was here. He was such a nice guy. We will um he was just here. He just left. So, he’s going to be working on this garden. So, um I would love to come back and show it after. But make sure you check out Shel and Christiey’s channel, Between Two Shrubs on YouTube because she’s going to be featuring it. Right, Shel? She’s going to be featuring the the renovation on her channel and maybe she’ll film it a trip to the nursery, whatever it is. Oh, yeah. But this is such a this is great because people can see a job that we’re solving problems. We’re making it aesthetically pleasing. We’re making it 100% more functional. This garden should have been in our book. I agree because this is a solving problems in the landscape gardens. Well, that’ll be book two. Book two. Book two. What? Anyway, thank you so much for being here on camera. We love hearing from you. Thank you, Shel, for letting us come here today, even after we had a really big rainstorm this week. So she was like, “It’s a mess with all the leaves on the ground.” It’s like, you know, my my house is just as messy like with the leaves on the ground. So your garden is so beautiful, Shel, and you’ve done such a good job adding adding the finishing touches. I hope you all enjoyed this, and I hope you all have a chance to get in your garden today. [Music]