Serving Nanaimo & Area
250.210.0895
This water feature build had a reward equal to the considerable physical and topographical challenge.
This project began with a pleasant conversation with a wonderful pair of clients, an outdated and failing water feature, and a “back of the napkin” sketch for a design idea.
The beach-front back yard location presented a beautiful backdrop – but also a considerable challenge.
Site access was restricted to a set of stairs that allowed us into the space; every rock had to be dropped off a 6-foot retaining wall and wheeled, dragged, or carried over to the work site. On top of this, any existing stone that couldn’t be reused had to be carried back up that staircase to be hauled away.
For all the hard work, we can be thankful the hole was already dug for us!
For this water feature project, we again found ourselves with a dream scenario: complete creative freedom.
This water feature needed to be alive!
We envisioned an abundance of moving water in a tropical setting, with multiple pools, multiple spillways, and lush aquatic planting.
The location of this backyard, with a gorgeous backdrop of Piper’s Lagoon, meant we had serious competition. It was important to keep this build to an appropriate scale, and to ensure we worked with the abundance of natural beauty that was just a few meters away.
The acoustic qualities of this water feature were also top-of-mind during the design phase. We knew that the tones of our water feature needed to be soft, and should play off the deeper bass rumble of the lagoon's waves.
We carefully route all the water in the feature so that it falls into shallow pools. This approach resulted in higher-pitched sounds that compliment the lagoon's own symphony without getting in the way of conversation or competing with the ocean beyond.
The gorgeous backdrop of Piper’s Lagoon gave our water feature serious competition and provided us with unique challenges.
This water feature was designed to compliment the property's ocean background with a natural and flowing aesthetic.
We were drawn to the rugged beauty of granite boulders for this water feature's chosen building material. The boulders served both as an homage to the original water feature that we were replacing and because of their construction properties.
As granite boulders generally have beautiful faces to build with, our pieces fit together perfectly with very minimal grinding, chipping, or cutting.
We let water loose everywhere possible, as there was no desire to limit the water movement to linear spillways and streams.
The result was four main spillways, a small stream, and multiple smaller outlets that compliment the natural look of this water feature. The main basin occupies about 50% of the feature and will house fish in the future.
This water feature is built to last and easy to maintain thanks to a careful selection and installation of components.
One of the key elements to this water feature is a bio filter constructed of stratified gravel layers and plants. Over time, the biofilter will form its own natural ecosystem, keeping algae to a minimum and ensuring the water is chemical-free and safe for the birds and insects that come to rely on these water sources in summer.
We used an adjustable water pump with an operating capacity of 4000-8000 gallons per hour. Each of the top two pools has an outlet in it, and those outlets have clean-outs so we can vacuum out any sediment that may accumulate over the year.
Plant maintenance is scheduled once annually for a cut back, with some occasional trimming to keep things looking neat.
This water feature includes a bio filter which over time will form its own natural ecosystem.