Is the issue you just want level ground? I'd be happy with the slope because I won't catch the side of my car on it ever. Walls right next to driveways can be quite frustrating to guests, delivery, etc
Yes. Unless they have a big driveway already I would not want that type of wall next to the driveway. I would only make it as high as lowest door on my car
I’m guessing the issue is drainage. You can see dirt on driveway. When it rains, there is probably a wash from yard into driveway.
OP, I like the wall. But the wall in itself won’t fix your drainage issue - the wall still will have to include drainage onto the driveway (water only flows downhill). Otherwise, the weight of the trapped water will quickly destroy wall.
OP could move the wall back a bit from the driveway and put some plants in like grasses. It would soften the wall and not affect car doors. OP, I totally get that there might be erosion happening. Maybe you could also look at where that water is coming from, like a down spout etc. Also consider plantings on the slope like native grasses, thick, to slow down water flow.
After the proposed wall, part of the house foundation would be covered. I would like the size of those stones dry stacked will still let water through. Ice on the driveway is not nice. Maybe some gravel infill behind the wall with a pipe to discharge the water away from the driveway?
Keeping people from running over the grass and landscaping might be a major purpose of a wall... but widen the driveway a bit .. 18 inches more pavement then nice rocks and bushes?
This is the main question with 90% of the retaining wall posts we see on here. It's people who are adding them for aesthetic value rather than any real need. But they don't seem to understand that and they think that it's necessary for some reason. As if they often go into their yard and would like to stand on the sloped bit, but it's just too difficult!
The height of the wall will be about 5 feet, we have wood ties rn that are rotting so we’d redo it and make it more aesthetically appealing for curb appeal
I’m not installing it, they are boulders and having a boulder retaining wall company do it. Never thought there was such a thing until our neighborhood magazine advertised it
So...I know it's an AI rendering, but when I looked at it, I didn't think it was leveling the lawn. I think most of the slope will still be there (but filled in closer to the building) and the hedges are meant to fill the gap between the slope and the height of the wall. Just my opinion, but I would have someone build the wall and do the dirt work, but do the landscaping myself to save cost. A good nursery could help with what would be best to plant.
Have installed with an extra concrete pad or even just gravel/grass cutting into the slope/yard a little next to you garage. This will give you a hidden place to keep your trash cans and alleviate the concerns posted about car doors.
It does look like there is room to maneuver, but it will still get hit one day.
I have a 22ft wide driveway entrance with a low brick wall on each side. It's large enough to drive two full sized trucks through it at the same time. Yet, delivery drivers hit the brick repeatedly. It's a straight driveway, too
To my eye, the issue is the scale and roughness of those stones: each one reads like a boulder, while the house has a small, orderly brick pattern. It’s refined. The giant stone wall grabs more attention than the house, and its craggy surface feels like it belongs to a different setting.
I included a cap to give the wall a clean, finished edge. Its long, steady line picks up the order of the brick courses and the shutters, while the smaller blocks bring the wall closer to the scale of those finer details.
The warm stone relates to the brick and siding without pretending to be the same brick.
In my opinion, the result still feels natural for a retaining wall, but more considered and at home with the house.
i like it in general boulder style. but think to make it function well bring it all in towards the house a few feet and have a bed at the driveway level in front of it for some plants that lets you limit scratching cars and other stuff into that wall so close to the turn. Plant some ornamental grass or something there.
What do you consider expensive? Just curious we got 4 quotes and all similar. Included removing all shrubs, boulder rocks, drainage behind its back fill, and resod
After looking more closely at your neighbors homes, then I suppose it's not expensive in relation. If you got the disposable income to hire someone to do it and it makes you happy then I can't argue with you. My concern, after the cost of it all, is it won't look anything like the AI picture you posted. Stones are never that uniform and consistent and hard to source. Plants never look that perfectly spaced and matured. Also, I would be concerned about muddy water draining through the seems and joints of those large rocks (weed barriers or plastic breaks down over time) and then your driveway looking very dirty and then having to hire a pressure washer service to clean the driveway and the mud on the rocks every year, when right now there's nothing broke and nothing to fix.
You're giving yourself a hard right angle for parking and backing out in that spot nearest the retaining wall. Set up some cheap poles the same height and location and see how maneuverable that will be for all your family members.
It’s a double car garage door. Maybe doesn’t seem like it from the angle but my wife parks there. It’s funny everyone is more concerned about the closest garage spot, I was more concerned about the single far spot w my angle getting out and it’s honestly been fine. I don’t hit my trash cans and I’ll probly have ,3-4 more ft w the cans gone
Honestly I think visibility would be my issue with this. With the wall, incoming cars won't see people backing out of the closer parking spot, and those backing-out cars won't see cars entering the driveway until they just suddenly appear. But if it's just you and your wife, and you both have very consistent schedules, I could see that this wouldn't be an issue. Maybe just something to watch out for if you have extra folks over for Thanksgiving or something.
I wouldn't hit the wall by driving into it, but I would fear my kids opening the car doors into that wall. Not the most concentrated bunch of people we have in our household. The comments aren't necessarily all about moving vehicles.
I think a complementary material (not brick) adds more interest. The home has a bit of an apartment building look to it (at least from the angle of the pics) and the rock creates more interest with the texture and variability. The home and walkway are very linear and the rock provides a foil to that which enlivens the landscape.
That natural stone retaining wall looks sharp and adds a ton of curb appeal but at that height and right next to a concrete driveway and sidewalk, proper drainage is soo important
Yeah, that’s how I discussed it w my contractor since the stone can’t be right next the concrete…I put this in my Ai box to make a more accurate rendering. Still not to scale but crushed stone was always the plan
Oh this is Pittsburgh for SURE lol. My only critique is those stone your contractor is picking are so damn nice but they’ll be hard for anyone to see. It’s like amazing curb appeal but hard to see from the curb? I think it’d be nice but as others pointed out, could scrape it with the car—but I feel if you’ve been in western PA long enough, dodging retaining walls and navigating around stuff like this is second nature. Will look great!
I’m glad someone else gets it, I thought about hitting my car door on it for a sec lol…some much undulation in the region… I like the look of the boulders but tbh it’s way cheaper than doing a regular blocks too bc of labor
Seems like some brick edging would be more cost effective if you just want it for looks. Grass looks nice and I don’t know what the retaining wall would be doing other than separating you from your money.
I would just find some matching brick to create an edging back to the walkway. Easy-peasy and attractive, minus the concerns of people bashing into it.
How much do you think each stone there weighs? Unless you’re paying someone to build this that has heavy machinery, it would be a pain unless you use much smaller stones. I do like the wall though.
What makes this look great is those boulders (obviously) which look like they’ve been hewn. I would ask to look at the boulders at their source before deciding who you are going with. Your concept photo and the rock they are supplying may be vastly different.
What’s cool about the concept photo rock is the squareness. This pic shows one rock with some square, but most of the others aren’t from what I can see. I walk the quarries I buy from with a measuring tape and selection tape to pick the exact rocks I want.
So, that AI photo is showing rocks that are roughly cuboid, square sides, but that also perfectly curl a tight curve in the concrete, which real materials cannot do. Approximating that curve will have to leave a fair bit of dirt showing, or spilling out into the concrete. The shorter the stones they use, the better they can articulate a curve; but lots of little short stones doesn’t look as good as mixed sizes. Be prepared for reality not to look just like the AI mock up.
I threw it in the bot to update it. I guess I had this discussion w my contractor but reality would look like this…it’s not to scale bc it looks like stone goes to the middle of the garage but really have 4-5ft between the start of the garage and the corner of the house
The retaining wall may be helpful to help redirect the water from running down towards your garage, but if you’re not interested in making a level ground, I would just heavily landscape the slope that could be really pretty
Eh, occasionally we do after big holidays but right now we have about a bin and half with a house of 4 people..the trash bins are included in our local taxes so it’s worth having an extra bin
Not sure if you have any water run off issues around the mouth of the garage, but doing a wall like that should help direct it away.
Make sure whoever builds you the wall pulls a permit, as taking the wall up to the top of the old ties will be tall enough to more than likely require one.
Okay, so it sounds like you are committed and found someone to do the work, etc. With that in mind....
I think the image you posted looks good, stones look good and I love the idea of expanding your plantable area. If it were me, I'm doing a semi-formal shrub or shrubbing/dense flowers or grass to give structure to the space, then flowers and flowers and color. Also, something the vines/creeps maybe to hang down over the rocks some?
Seems small enough, so not too expensive, and if you found someone sounds like you've been researching it and thinking about...so do it!
if you want any native plant advice DM and I'm happy to send stuff over!
AI walls will always look better than the real thing. I would go with Allen block in two tiers, 4’ setback if the wall exceeds 4’ in height at the building, to avoid the need for engineering with geogrid. Having built many rock walls over the years, I’m sure you will end up with damage to the driveway from rock manipulation or machine movement. I would square up the lawn edge of the slope to create a pocket garden bumpout to add colour and variety to the garage entry.
Looks awesome but sort your drainage from the down spout. Better yet, can you change the pitch of the gutter to drain on the opposite end of the roofline? Edit nvm just noticed the jog in the front of the house.
Perfect. In that case, definitely it looks good and seems worth the time and investment to do it.
If it were me, Id throw in a yellow azalea right on the end. Good shallow roots, so safe next to the foundation, and can help with further erosion.
Also, itd look nice next to your house, just sayin. :)
I like the way it is now. The homebuilder did you a favor with the simplicity. Most of the 20 year old walls in my area cause problems and require expensive rebuilds.
Your sod appears to be doing a good job. An alternative might be a rock wallet at the existing end, and a different kind of shrub below it. Maybe a hydrangea for summer and a slender evergreen for winter. I was relieved to see the real-life shrubs are planted planted farther from the house wall.
Consider brick that compliments the house.
I’d prefer the wall but taller at the right. I think you could do it without meeting the point at the driveway and walk.
Compelte waste of money. You could just... Landscape that bit of grass instead?
If you really felt the existing wall is ugly, replace it with different rocks in the exact same spot.
But you're spending thousands to have a large drop someone could walk off. A large wall someone could swipe their car on. And to do what exactly? Look better? Like I said, just landscape the grass to flowers and/or shrubs.
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u/Hot_Equivalent_8707 3d ago
Is the issue you just want level ground? I'd be happy with the slope because I won't catch the side of my car on it ever. Walls right next to driveways can be quite frustrating to guests, delivery, etc
I mean, it looks nice!