Graceful Alcove Provides Peaceful Haven In Garden
by Kathy Huber

Joyce Russell has poured 10 years of weekend work into her Oak Forest garden. Now that she's retired, she's enjoying that decade of effort and looking forward to another.

Galveston-born and a Houston resident since 1947, Russell found her first order of business when she moved to the smaller lot was to reclaim a neglected, overgrown landscape.

Heavy shade had diminished the back lawn, so she began dumping gravel, bag by bag, to form a network of paths around the yard -- and mud. Along the winding walkway she began to create areas of interest, several influenced by a visit to China. There's a pagoda tucked near a sago palm, and a stone deity -- Kuan Yin, goddess of compassion and mercy -- stands among the shell gingers in a back corner.

After hauling in a lot of good soil, Russell added shade-tolerant plants -- azaleas, gardenias, ferns and ardisia. She put in a large fountain, a deck and arbor, and bits of color in the predominantly green setting.

And she enlarged the 1950s patio, hung bird feeders and a 200-pound English Victorian gate, and left a woodsy patch for wildlife, including the mockingbirds who appreciate the red yaupon berries.

"I wanted the garden to be peaceful, quiet," says Russell, whose favorite spot is a brick alcove just large enough for a small table and chairs, where she can enjoy a cup of coffee or read a book.

Although she had help with the installation, the design is her own. The semicircular alcove rests on an 8-inch-thick, 8-by-8-foot concrete slab reinforced by iron rebar supports imbedded beneath the brick wall. The curving wall, she notes, consists of two courses of brick, and is 5 feet tall tapering to 3 feet at each end. The wall is capped with a band of single bricks; the concrete slab is dressed with flagstone. A pair of handsome, liriope-filled urns frame the alcove.

The Chicago Used brick raised the construction cost to $750, she says, but the structure could be built with considerable savings by using less expensive brick.