The Dunwoody back yard problem is nearly always the same one

Most of Dunwoody was built between the late 1960s and the 1990s on generous lots. Dunwoody Club Forest runs roughly four tenths to eight tenths of an acre, Hidden Branches goes to an acre and more, Withmere, Village Mill, Redfield, Wynterhall and Brooke Farm are all in that range. That is a lot of ground. And in house after house, the family uses about fifteen feet of it.

The pattern repeats: a deck off the back of the house that is too high and too hot to sit on, a strip of struggling fescue in the shade of oaks that were young when the house was built, a wet corner where two downspouts meet, and then a slope down to the property line that nobody has walked on in years. Nothing is wrong exactly. It just never got designed, and fifty years of adding a bit at a time have left a yard with no plan in it.

A makeover is not a new patio bolted on to that. It is deciding what the whole back of the property is for, then building it in an order that works.

Call (404) 369-0989 or book a free site visit. Design-build projects are quoted after we have walked the property with you, and phased if that suits you better.

The order we build in, and why it matters

Water first. Always. If the yard has a wet corner, a downspout washing out a bed, or ground that slopes toward the house, that gets solved before anything is built on top of it. Fixing drainage after a patio is in means taking the patio up. Perimeter Creek starts in Dunwoody and the whole city drains toward it, and on Cecil red clay water moves across the surface rather than into it. How we approach it is on the Dunwoody drainage and grading page.

Then the shape of the ground. Cutting a level area out of a slope, terracing a bank, building the steps that connect the back door to the part of the yard nobody visits. On these lots a change in level is usually what unlocks the space. Walls do that work: retaining walls in Dunwoody.

Then the hard surfaces. The patio, the path, the fire pit, the seat wall, the outdoor kitchen. This is the part everyone pictures when they say makeover, and it is the third thing we build, not the first. Paver patios and fire pits.

Then the planting. Beds with a structure to them, screening where you want privacy from the house behind, shade planting under the oaks where turf was never going to work, and a lawn area sized for how the family actually uses it rather than covering everything left over.

Then lighting. Last, because it should follow the finished shape of the garden. A low-voltage run finishes in a day or two and it is what turns a back yard into somewhere used in the evening. Landscape lighting.

Planting for the yard you actually have

Dunwoody is Zone 8a, on thin topsoil over red clay, under a heavy oak and poplar canopy in the older neighbourhoods. Two things follow. One, a lot of these yards are trying to grow a sun lawn in shade and losing every year, and the honest fix is often less turf, not better turf. Two, natives raised for this Piedmont soil establish faster and need far less water and feeding than the standard nursery pallet.

What we plant most: oakleaf hydrangea, American beautyberry, fothergilla and Piedmont azalea in the shrub layer; serviceberry, redbud, fringe tree and American hornbeam as understory trees, hornbeam especially where the ground stays damp; black-eyed Susan, butterfly weed, Joe-pye weed and columbine for sun; Lenten rose, foamflower, green-and-gold and Christmas fern under the oaks; little bluestem, river oats and pink muhly for movement and winter structure; Carolina jessamine on a fence or a rail.

Watering rules matter to how a makeover is planned. Under the Georgia Water Stewardship Act outdoor watering runs 4 p.m. to 10 a.m., with new plantings exempt for their first 30 days and drip and hand-watering exempt any time. We install on a drip system where it makes sense, which keeps new beds legal to water and cuts consumption a long way once they are established.

The rules that shape a Dunwoody project

A land disturbance permit covers grading, grubbing, tree removal, driveway work and stormwater work, with an erosion control bond. Decks always need a permit. Fences need one in a front yard, on a corner lot or in a stream buffer, and none if the fence sits entirely behind the house.

The one that surprises people most is impervious surface. A street-facing yard is capped at 35 percent coverage, so 65 percent of the front stays permeable, and gravel counts as impervious. A gravel drive needs a durable border and a concrete apron. If your makeover touches the front, this is worth knowing before the design rather than after.

Retaining walls: the city publishes a fence and wall application but no height threshold, and all four surrounding cities use four feet. Plan on a permit and an engineer’s drawing above four feet, and confirm with Dunwoody Community Development. Anything within the 75-foot stream buffer needs approval regardless. The city arborist is the right first call on trees.

Noise: landscape contractors here may not run mowers or blowers before 7:30 a.m. or after 8:30 p.m. on weekdays, before 8 a.m. or after 8:30 p.m. on Saturdays, and not at all on Sundays or holidays.

Built without a gas engine on the property

We are Dunwoody’s all-electric crew, and the City of Dunwoody gave us its 2023 Sustainability Hero Award in the business category for it. Everything runs on battery and charges from a solar trailer, which on a multi-week build means no generator drone, no fuel stored on your driveway, and no exhaust in the yard where your children are going to be playing in a month.

A plate compactor and a masonry saw are still loud, and we will not tell you otherwise. What is gone is the constant engine noise between the loud bits, and in neighbourhoods where the houses sit close and half the street works from home, that is the difference between a project people tolerate and one they complain about.

Questions Dunwoody homeowners ask about backyard makeovers

How long does a whole back yard take? A single-phase project with drainage, a patio, steps and planting is commonly four to eight weeks on site, plus design and permit time before that. Larger design-build projects run longer, and rain on clay adds days because saturated soil cannot be compacted properly.

Can we do it in stages? Yes, and a lot of our clients do. The important thing is that the whole design is drawn first, so that the drainage and the levels are set correctly in stage one and stage three does not mean undoing them. Phasing spreads the cost. Building without a plan just costs more slowly.

Do I need a permit? It depends what is in the project. Grading, tree removal, driveway and stormwater work sit under a land disturbance permit, decks always need one, walls above four feet should be assumed to, and fences depend on where they go. We identify what is needed at the design stage and file it.

Can you save the big trees? That is normally the point. The mature oaks are the best thing about most Dunwoody back yards and they are irreplaceable in our lifetimes. We design around root plates, hand-dig where a hard surface has to come close, and put shade planting where turf has been failing.

Our yard is on a slope. Is that a problem? It is an opportunity, though it costs more than flat. Terraces give you two or three usable rooms at different levels instead of one awkward hill, and they usually keep individual walls under the height that needs an engineer.

Will you replace the lawn? Often we shrink it. Fescue under a mature oak canopy will disappoint you every August no matter who installs it. A smaller, properly sited lawn with real beds around it looks better and costs less to keep.

Is the electric equipment strong enough for a full build? Yes. Commercial battery excavation, cutting and compaction machines have handled every project we have taken. The only thing you will notice is how quiet the site is.

What does a backyard makeover cost? It depends entirely on scope, access and how much the ground has to move, and any number offered before we walk the property would be invented. The site visit is free, and you get a written scope and a phased option if you want one.

Nearby

Dunwoody is home for us. Everything else we do here is on the Dunwoody page, and we run the same design-build work in Sandy Springs, Brookhaven, Chamblee, Doraville and Peachtree Corners. For keeping it looking right afterwards, see quiet electric maintenance and eco-friendly lawn care. Client comments are on the reviews page.

A fair number of these makeovers end up with cooking in the back yard, and that is worth deciding early rather than bolting on afterwards, because it changes where the patio goes and where people walk. What actually gets used, and what gets unplugged after one summer, is set out on our outdoor kitchens page.

Book a site visit

The first visit is a walk round the yard with a notepad, not a sales call. (404) 369-0989 · book a free site visit. Design-build projects are priced after that, in writing, phase by phase if that is how you want to do it.