Arvada, Colorado. A family with a handsome stucco-and-stone home backing to open space asked us a simple question: why does it feel so hard to get to our own front door?
The problem: an entry working against the property
The front of the property sloped toward the street, and turf was losing the fight. Grass was dying along the access routes, irrigation oversprayed the grade, and mowing the slope was a chore nobody wanted. The plastic edging had heaved out of the ground, and a run of sunken flagstone steppers had settled so low that guests genuinely could not tell where the front door was. Meanwhile the property had real assets: mature shade trees, outstanding fall color, and views to the greenbelt behind the fence.
The design: a wide, welcoming walk — and a framework that grows
We removed the struggling turf entirely and rebuilt the entry around a wide banded-concrete walkway that curves from the driveway to the front porch — generous enough for two people to walk side by side, with a poured border band that reads like a drawn line on a plan. No more guessing where the door is: the walk itself does the welcoming.
Around it, we built the bones of a water-wise landscape: granite boulders placed in natural groupings, dry-creek drainage channels of river cobble that move roof and slope water away from the walk, crushed-stone bands along the path edges, and a crushed-gravel path looping the side of the property for easy access. Low-voltage path lights mark the route after dark.
Built to evolve, not just to finish
This is a design-first framework. The hardscape, drainage, boulders, and irrigation zones are permanent; the planting plan phases in over the coming seasons. As ground covers and perennials establish, they will knit across the beds and steadily reduce the mulched area — less mulch to refresh each year, more living ground. The family adds plantings on their timeline, inside a structure that already works.
The result
An entry that reads clearly from the street, sheds water where it should, needs no mowing on a slope, and frames the trees and fall color the family already loved. The landscape looks intentional on day one and gets better every season.
Thinking about your own front entry?
Owner-led, with 25+ years of hands-on landscape experience. Building as Colorado Native Landscapes & Design since 2018.