A Thousand Oaks backyard, rebuilt from a dead lawn.

The lawn was dead and the slope at the back of the yard had nothing holding it. We dug out the old lawn by hand and graded the yard.

A curved split-face block retaining wall went in first, to hold the slope and frame the yard. Then the patio: rebar on a compacted base inside curved forms, poured and stamped in an ashlar-slate pattern with a smooth border band.

New irrigation went in before the sod, and the wall was planted with shrubs, flowers and path lights. The finished yard has a lawn, a patio and a planted wall instead of dirt and dead grass.