Wet & Wild
Creating a natural look means landscaping outside the lines
The sound hits you first. Or maybe it’s the vibrant flowers, species unfamiliar, even exotic. It’s the fish in the ponds. No, no it’s the waterfall, set in a scene like a tropical rain forest, dripping with flora and fauna arranged to look so unplanned and natural you just know it took hours, months, a year even to complete.
Shhh, please, I’m relaxing.
Hear that? Trickling water, chirping birds, waterfall. I think I just heard a trout jump.
Why shouldn’t the outside of the home be as stunning as the inside?
Tom Mullen’s outdoor landscaping complements his magnificent Burt Lake estate, where about 600 feet of stream starts at the well-top of a hillside, wends downward through carefully placed landscaping and dense forest, across stone plateau steps, eventually under a bridge that crosses the driveway and into Burt Lake.
On its journey, it passes under sidewalks, through a tree stump, alongside hundreds of plants and flowers and between the main and guest houses.
Installed by Drost Landscape, the water feature rivals Mother Nature herself. All that’s missing are the fish. “There wasn’t a print on this,” said Mullen, who has built up the property over the past 10 years. “It was all in Bob’s head. It looks like it’s been here forever.”
Maintaining the grounds is a regular job for crews from Northstar Gardens in Indian River. “You’re as close as you can get to creating nature without having an actual stream coming through your property,” said Jeff Jakeway, owner of Northstar, who said water features are a growing landscaping trend.
Creating that natural look is what homeowners are seeking as they beautify their outdoor landscape as much as their interior living areas. At the Mullen property, that theme carries over to the custom hot tub Drost is creating in an adjacent cupola room off the main house.
The hot tubs Drost designs don’t have a traditional standard acrylic shape and finish. Rather, they’re formed out of huge boulders, placed strategically to create seating and an atmosphere like a natural hot spring.
It’s such a cool concept that Drost was invited to speak at a recent industry event on his installation process.
“We have 25 of these out there,” said Drost. “The whole vault system is hidden. We try to hide as much as possible. These hot tubs are unmatched.”
Give Drost the reins and his imagination starts flowing. At one Lake Charlevoix home, trout have the run of a stream that travels from a pond at the front walkway, down the side of the house and into another large pond settled into the sloping landscaping. Here, another boulder-shaped hot tub includes a waterfall of warm water.
He prefers to add trout to most of his ponds and water features, but sometimes it’s not possible because of DNR restrictions.
“I try to make it as natural as possible,” said Drost. “You build an atmosphere that draws the family in. At the end, that’s what matters, relationships and the time you spend with others.”
He said area builder Andy Poineau was his inspiration for letting nature take its course, with boulder placement and water feature layouts that look unintentional in their purposefulness. That means often using loose granite slabs as stairs and hand-selecting rocks for streambed borders. High-quality lighting fixtures and placement — including up in trees — further the effect homeowners are seeking in enjoying their outdoor living areas, Drost said.
He and his staff helped create that ideal atmosphere for the Cannon family, Lake Charlevoix residents.
Dr. Louis and Sally Cannon find respite in their flourishing gardens and the water features that flow through their lakeside property. As one of the top 100 cardiologists in the nation and head of the Heart and Vascular Center of Northern Michigan Regional Hospital, Louis, his wife said, will even head out at night with his flashlight after work to check on the plants and flowers.
“It’s his therapy. We just love it,” said Sally. “It’s an expensive back yard, but this becomes your extended living room. Every morning and every night we walk through and see what’s new.”
The Cannons and their three children enjoy the natural and manmade surroundings, particularly the custom grotto-like hot-tub. It’s more than a spa, with its handplaced inlaid stones along the floor and mammoth boulders that form the structure, a cascading waterfall and panoramic view of the lake.
As Sally puts it, “This is a work of art.” HL
