ReadyMade: Instructions for everyday life

From Tiny Seeds…

Three garden makeovers for $300

by Katherine Sharpe

Photos by Erin Kunkel, Jack Thompson, Jeffery Salter

A year ago, ReadyMade challenged readers to reimagine their outdoor spaces on a razor-thin budget. Three teams submitted plans that won them $300 to fund a garden makeover. Frankly, we’re impressed by what they’ve grown.

Bedroom Set

WHO
Christina Amini, 32

WHERE
San Francisco

DAY JOB
Editor

WHY
Improve a yard without violating a lease

Christina Amini and her wife, Elspeth Stowell, wanted to enjoy their patio area more, but as renters, they couldn’t build immovable fixtures. So with neighbor Sarah Keizer they designed a garden with modular, movable parts. A sense of fun reigns supreme in their space, with a “lawn chair” covered in AstroTurf, a fire pit made from an old wheelbarrow, and the “raised bed”—a real bed frame filled with soil and planted with a “quilt” of lettuce and chives. Amini scored chairs at San Francisco’s Building REsources salvage yard and kept costs down by scrounging (a sofa from Keizer’s garage, tables at the curb on trash night). If Amini were to change anything, it would be the size of the raised bed, which is less portable than she planned: “The full moves,” she says, “but it’s really heavy!”

Southern Comfort

WHO
Robert Rausch, 42

WHERE
Tuscumbia, Alabama

DAY JOB
Design Center Director

WHY
Make a dark outdoor area usable at night

The building that houses Robert Rausch’s GAS Design Center provides a home to design interns who regularly eat meals on the back patio. But after dark the outdoor area, which has no electricity and no light, became a wasteland. Rausch came up with a fix—a modern twist on the old Southern tradition of bottle trees. His are festooned with a strand of solar LED Christmas lights. The “trees” are welded from leftover construction rebar, and the bottles have been slumped, or heated until they sag, for a drippy, melted effect. Rausch picked up a wooden Jack Daniel’s barrel at an antiques shop (at $75, it was his largest single purchase), and installed a spigot. The barrel collects rainwater from the studio’s gutters, which Rausch uses to hydrate the revamped garden. The LEDs’ after-dark glow, “like bright candlelight,” Rausch says, subtly lights the intimate evening space.

Shower Power

WHO
Annie Thomas, 40

WHERE
Gainesville, Florida

DAY JOB
Science teacher

WHY
Take back a patch of lawn wrecked by construction

In Gainesville, explains Annie Thomas, “it’s either monsoon or drought,” so gardeners need irrigation. She and her husband, Alexis, had been considering putting raised vegetable beds into a corner of their yard left bare by a swimming pool installation, and they’d always wanted an outdoor shower. A hose-fed shower whose graywater irrigates their garden patches accomplishes both missions. The couple poured a concrete pad, built a privacy screen from a metal roofing sheet, and coiled a black garden hose in the sun, which warms enough water for a quick rinse. The shower and garden beds are edged with 489 inverted wine bottles that Thomas collected from friends, restaurants, and wine stores, and half-buried for a neat look that helps prevent soil erosion in damp areas.