To solve drainage problems, improve wheelchair accessibility, and expand our outdoor spaces for learning and socializing, we collaborated with “Lori Daul Design: Lush Landscapes for Tough Climates” and Newmatic to create a river and riverwalk that are beautiful and functional. During heavy rains, this faux river becomes a working river directing water away from the house and walkways. The riverwalk connects four flagstone patios, three ponds, and a pool.
Two Stimpunks directly helped build all of this, cutting and setting the stone, with the rest of us learning and helping here and there.
William Alcott – and we’re talking early 1830s and he was, more or less, creating schools from almost nothing – talked about how the garden was essential, how a collection of distracting wonders was essential, how a covered porch – allowing learning to stay outdoors in any weather – was essential.
Timeless Learning: How Imagination, Observation, and Zero-Based Thinking Change Schools
school should go further than providing space, light, and air: “It should be a place where the child can feel that he belongs, where he can move in freedom, and where he can enjoy immediate contact with the outdoors.”
The Design of Childhood: How the Material World Shapes Independent Kids
Irie Smial Preserve 