Lowcountry Woodland Garden

Painted brick columns and custom gates at the drive, a sapele-toned entry pergola, and bluestone paths through a shady Lowcountry woodland garden.

The brief for this James Island garden was a Lowcountry woodland: shady, green and quiet, with an arrival that feels intentional from the moment you turn in.

At the driveway, what had been an ordinary fence became painted brick columns and a pair of custom gates. We built the gates ourselves from pressure-treated lumber, painted to match, with a metal frame inside each leaf. Without that frame a wooden double gate slowly sags until the two halves no longer meet; with it, they swing and latch in line for years. The fence beyond the columns is ours too, along with a matching screen wall that hides the air-conditioning units, reached across bluestone stepping stones.

Inside, you pass under an entry pergola in stained pressure-treated lumber. We matched the stain to a sapele tone so it picks up the wood on the house instead of fighting it. The gate beneath the pergola is ours as well, with a code lock, so family and friends come and go without a key.

From there, full-range bluestone walkways, every shade from blue-grey to rust, wind through the garden to a bluestone patio.

The planting is what makes it a woodland. Mondo grass carpets the ground, ferns and tractor seat plant fill in beneath the canopy, oakleaf hydrangeas bring big white blooms in early summer, and Japanese maples give the garden its structure and its autumn color. Everything was chosen for shade and texture, so the garden settles in rather than fighting the shade.