Front Porch Redesign: Flagstone Installation

My blogging hiatus is over – I hope! This has been a very busy summer which gardening, guests, travel, and lots of house projects. I have so much content to share with you, but not a lot of time to put it down on paper. I will do my best to get back into the swing of things.

The most recent progress we have made in our attempt to renovate every square inch of our house is the completion of the front porch project (almost….).

The mason came out last week and rebuilt the porch, removing the third step (now there are only two), creating a proper step from the walkway to the driveway, and laying a new concrete base to continue the flagstone down to the sidewalk. We saved quite a bit of money because we had all of the stone already. It was loosely laid in a patio formation in the backyard when we moved in, and when we installed the sod a few years back we stacked it behind the garage for future use.

I am almost done with the landscaping in the front. I added the boxwoods at the end of the path a few months ago, and last week I filled the area in with drift roses and silver mounding artemisia. I moved the rest of the plants to the backyard and I plan to fill in the sides with pachysandra. The heat is killing me though and the first planting of pachysandra died off. It’s been an average of 15° hotter than normal and the heat has done a number on the grass, some ground cover and the impatiens I planted as a border.

What do you think of the reveal? I still need to add some type of flowering bush to the front left of the steps and finish the pachysandra on the right side by the driveway.

BEFORE:

AFTER: