Discovery Hill Outdoor Learning Center

The Native Plant Society of Texas held their 2015 symposium this year in Austin, and as part of that they offered various tours, including one of an outdoor learning garden that was commissioned by the Austin Independent School District (AISD).    It is located in south Austin behind their Science and Health Resource Center and serves as a resource for the entire school district.  Busloads of elementary, middle and high school students show up weekly to work on curriculum focused around the garden. 

Environmental Survey Consulting (ESC) was hired by AISD to design and install the garden which was opened in 2013.  This  construction included a vegetated swale, an information kiosk, planting terraces, planting beds, etc.  Most of the labor was done by volunteers led by a project manager from ESC.  With this in mind, the construction details were kept intentionally simple and rustic to allow for future replacement by volunteers with readily available materials and minimum carpentry skills.  This mainly included cedar logs, limestone blocks, and treaded wood posts.  The irrigation was the one element that was professionally installed because of the more specific knowledge needed for that work.

Cedar Log Fence

Limestone Seat Block & Cedar Log Planting Bed Edge

The Science and Health Resource Center sits at the top of a slope and forms the north boundary for the garden.  Water pours off the roof directly into the landscape, so a gravel strip of river rock was added as a splash dissipator and a perforated pipe under the rock conveys the water to the vegetated swale on the east side of the garden.  The slope is terraced with cedar log retaining walls, and cedar and decomposed granite steps provide three routes through the terraced beds.  At the bottom of the slope is a DG path running east to west which is separated from a second such path by a string of garden beds.

Drainage River Rock at Top of Slope

Cedar Log Terraces with Decomposed Granite Steps

Garden Decomposed Granite Pathway

Path & Pond

One of the most popular features of the garden is a small pond in a galvanized water tank.  Teachers have seen this and replicated it at several different schools.  The aquatic plants in the tank were planted in plastic containers that where embedded in a slump of concrete.   Refill of the pond is manually done, so there's no auto-fill or any other mechanical components like that.  Vandalism of the pond was a big problem, but the school installed a motion sensor light and a security still capture camera, and these deterrents have really helped.

Stock  Tank Pond

Aquatic Plant Pot with Concrete Slump

A main educational feature of the garden is its showcase of native habitat areas.  The original planting plan featured palettes for Short Grass Meadow, Woodland Edge, Riparian Edge, etc.  The garden   is a "Certified Schoolyard Habitats Site" as designated by the National Wildlife Federation.   Many plants were in full bloom when I was there, such as Engelmann's Daisy (Engelmannia peristenia) and Fall Aster (Symphyotrichum oblongifolium).  The Inland Sea Oats (Chasmanthium latifolium) plants were also heavily laden with seed heads.  While we toured there garden you could hear mockingbirds singing, and we saw a lot of birds flying in and out in general.  It's great that AISD has this garden as a resource for children to learn about the local habitat and also get some general exposure to nature.

Certified Schoolyards Habitat

Engelmann's Daisy and Wooden Bench

Narrowleaf Snakeherb and Fall Aster

Inland Sea Oats

Texas State Cemetery

Although I spent 5 weeks after graduate school traveling and studying urban cemeteries, it took me 7 years of living in Austin to finally visit the Texas State Cemetery.  It's east of I-35 in Austin about a mile from the state capitol building which supplies most of the interred residents.  There is a list of burial requirements, and the top two are being a former state official or member of the state legislature.  Beyond that a person may be selected based on their specific contributions to the state and its history.

The Texas State Cemetery was officially established in 1854  and became a burial site for prominent Texas and Austinites, such as Austin's first mayor Edwin Waller.  A later movement to get Texas historical and cultural icons re-interred to the cemetery found the likes of Stephen F. Austin having a new grave established there.  In 1939 the Texas Highway Department paved the cemetery road and declared it Highway 165, which at 1/2 mile is the shortest in Texas.  With a 10mph posted speed limit I also imagine it's the slowest highway in Texas (except MoPac at rush hour).  In 1994 Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock led efforts to renovate the cemetery which resulted in a new visitor center, a recirculating pond, a columbarium wall, and other improvements.

Entry with Highway 165 Sign and Posted Speed Limit

The limestone monument sign on 7th Street for the Texas State Cemetery has a backdrop of some large live oak trees, whose dark shaded canopies contrast the bright stone.  The wall's overgrout joints give the look of older masonry, although I suspect it's actually part of the 1994 renovation because it matches closely the stone work at the visitor center that was completed in 1996 as part of that same effort.
The visitor center is a long building off Navasota Street, and the structure was modeled after the barracks at the Alamo.  I mistakenly thought is was an older building when I visited and hadn't yet read much about the history of the cemetery.  There are some vertical expansion joints along the wall where you can see how they overlapped the  coursing for the different height bands of stone for the wall.  The wrought iron gates here at the main entry (and also at other side entries) have a star-topped Fleur-de-lis that matches that of the fencing at the Texas Capitol.

Visitor Center

Vertical Expansion Joint in Stone Wall

Star-topped Fleur-de-lis

The recirculating pond is the first thing you see as you pass through into the cemetery, and it screams out English pastoral landscape to me.   The turf and trees character of the cemetery overall has a "memorial park"  feel to it.  The Tasman Flax Lily and Knockout Rose in the foreground just add to that, and I wish that the first impression from plants was more from  a native Texas pallette.  Limestone shelf rock boulders line the edge of the pond and form a few short waterfalls that give a damp place for some ferns and Ruellia to grow.  Where the limestone doesn't cover you can see the gunite shell of the pond.  Further down the water intake is obscured in shadow by a limestone overhang and the shade of an adjacent tree.

View of Recirculating Pond from Entry

Plants at Waterfall

Exposed Gunite

Pond Terminus

Highway 165 is a narrow vehicular roadway, 12' at most, that has concrete tire tracks and flagstone paving for the center stripe and edge.  Having the width broken up with different materials does help to give more of a pedestrian scale to the road which is nice.  A double allee of Texas flags runs down the north/south axis of the road just in case you forgot what state the cemetery was representing.  Texas is also celebrated explicitly in some grave markers as well, such as the granite marker I saw with the outline of the state.

Highway 165 with Flags

Roadway Paving

Texas-Shaped Grave Marker

There is some topography to the site, and the tallest point is Monument Hill which is topped with an oak tree surrounded by a low limestone seat wall.  It's a great place to sit and look out on the landscape.  Down to the south there's a view of low hanging branches of a live oak tree shading a surrounding group of graves.  If the grass wasn't so green and manicured the vista  would almost have a Hill Country feel to it.

Monument Hill Oak

Shaded Graves

Narrow (about 2' wide), exposed aggregate concrete paths wind their way through most of the grave sites.  This includes the white marble headstone for former Governor Ann Richards.  So much of the stone in the cemetery is local limestone or granite that it's unusual to find the white marble there. 
The confederate field is similar to many military grave sites and is striking for its uniformity.  When you are standing under the deep shade of oak trees looking out at the white limestone markers in bright sunlight the contrast of light adds to the drama of the view.

Exposed Aggregate Concrete Pedestrian Paths

Governor Ann Willis Richards Grave Marker

Confederate Field

A memorial plaza is on the south side of the cemetery, and it includes a variety of scales of natural stone.  I thought the mix of large flagstone pieces with smaller, almost mosaic pieces for the paving was interesting.  Drain covers are also crafted from the same stone with holes drilled in them.  It's not as clean a look as I would like, but the intent is laudable.  Steps up to the plaza have extended risers just above each landing that give a unique look to the stairs.

Memorial Plaza Wall

Flagstone Paving

Stone Drain Cover

Stone Steps to Memorial Plaza

Overall the cemetery feels more like a historic site to me than a burial ground.  I think that's mainly because the lack of personalization of graves with flowers, etc. like I am familiar with from other urban cemeteries I have visited.  It's also a cemetery that's striving to preserve history of the state, so it seems appropriate that this is what the landscape evokes.

Texas French Bread

Texas French Bread has been around since 1981, and at one point they operated numerous satellite bakery locations in Austin.  In 2007 they decided just to focus on the flagship location at 29th Street as a bakery but also more as a dinner bistro.  A new outdoor dining terrace was designed by Ten Eyck Landscape Architects and opened sometime in 2014.  The project was installed by 22 Construction.

The site is about 30 feet wide by 100 feet long (the size of a narrow residential house lot), with the short edge entry on Rio Grande Street.  The grading steps down from the sidewalk at Rio Grande, so the design terraces down overall on the east to west axis.  A set of stairs with metal risers and pea gravel treads leads you into the site from Rio Grande.  Rosemary is planted close on one side of the steps, and you can smell its fragrance as you brush against it.  The west end of the site ends with an ashlar pattern limestone block  wall that's about five feet tall with a row of Possumhaw Holly trees (Ilex decidua) in front of it.

View into Garden from Rio Grande

Steel Riser Steps with Pea Gravel Treads Next to Rosemary

Limestone Wall and Possumhaw Holly (Ilex decidua)

On the north side of the site there's a three foot board-formed concrete wall that separates the dining area from the adjacent residential property.  A small, weathered steel gate with woven wire mesh gives access through the gate out to the base of the heritage live oak that is shared with the residential property.  The long south face of the garden abuts the parking lot for Texas French Bread.  A series of rain gardens step down with the grade and form a buffer between the terrace and the parking.  They have small steel check dams and are planted with native grasses and small fruit trees.  The trees looked like plum to me, but I thought the contractor said they were pear trees.   Regardless, he did also say they were afflicted with fire blight and likely to be replaced.

Board-formed Concrete Wall

Pedestrian Gate with McNichols Woven Wire Mesh

Rain Gardens with Grasses and Fruit Trees

A steel pedestrian bridge leads you into the garden from the parking area, passing over the rain gardens.  A board-formed concrete water trough welcomes you into the garden with bubbling water and blossoms of water lilies.  The overflow for the water feature is, incidentally directed towards the rain gardens.  Gaps in the raised concrete curb that edge the decomposed granite paving of the terrace also allow water to sheet flow from this area into the rain garden.  This attention to the path of water is one of the signature elements of Ten Eyck's landscapes.

Steel Grating Pedestrian Bridge

Bubbling Water Trough

Water Lilies

Drainage Gaps to Rain Garden

The entry path from the parking lot bisects the garden in two, with the left side being a custom picnic table dining area and the right side anchored by a large pergola.  The weathered steel pergola provides a permable roof for the raised bar and bistro table dining area.  The steel tube posts for the pergola are about 8 inches in diameter, so they look pretty big when you see them up close, but from a distance they seem a good proportion.  McNichols woven wire mesh covers the top of the pergola and filters the sunlight coming through.  This material also matches that of the small pedestrian gate.  I spoke with the contractor on-site, and they described that aligning and spot welding each wire connecting point on these panels was labor intensive but looked good in the end.  String lights hang underneath for evening illumination.  These lights run the full length of the garden, connecting to eye hooks on weathered steel posts on the far end.  Deep purple Evergreen Wisteria vines (Millettia reticulata) are trained up wires that have a bottom eye bolt connection on the pergola posts and are somehow secured up a the top of the pergola as well in some fashion that I couldn't quite see.

Picnic Table Dining Area

Custom Steel Tube and Wood Tables

Pergola Dining Area

Weathered Steel Pergola with Woven Wire Mesh and Vines

String Light Connection on Pergola

String Light Connection to Post

Training Wire for Vines

Evergreen Wisteria (Millettia reticulata)

Overall, the terrace garden seemed like it would be a very pleasant place to dine at night, and even to eat lunch during the day with all the shade that is provided.  The vertical planting and structures help to create the feel of outdoor rooms so you're in a volume of space and not just a flat plane.  The dining area is pretty close to the adjacent residence, and I'm not sure how noisy it might get for the people who live there.  I'll have to go back and check out their bistro menu sometime soon.