Phase One

To get started with our planting plans we needed to get some things done first.

1. We needed to get removed the old falling down breeze way that cuts through the courtyard.

2. We needed to remove the unsightly freight containers that were placed onto the campus and functioned as a storage trap. But before we could do this we needed to move all of their contents into a storage room and organize the other materials so it fit into one container.

3. We needed to get the old woody plants cut down

4. We needed to get the surface of the courtyard resurfaced

We had one week to get it all done.

This past week was filled with coordinating, negotiating and lots of labor of fabulous volunteers – OK a little anxiety as well. Today the Asphalt people were scheduled to be at the school to slurry the pavement, and this was our deadline. On Saturday the scrap metal men showed up to start removing the old rusted breeze way. Sunday had over 27 parents, students and community members to unload the trailers and organize the storage room. On Sunday Tim Chang a parent of Lipman Alumni and professional tree trimmer donated his time and cut down all the old trees that use to be in the courtyard. Monday the metal men came back to finish the job. Tuesday morning Miguel Rios another parent and contractor professional came by to get the remnants of the posts screws grinded down and ready for the slurry. Then we needed to sweep, fill any holes with filler and be prepared for today's slurry.






After



Whew! This is where we are now. Notice how open the space is and how clean it looks with out the breeze way and the containers.

Before:


After:

The Plans

While originally we were thinking about removing the asphalt once we looked into what it would entail from an environmental standpoint to remediate the area after the asphalt was removed it was decided that the asphalt would remain. Not to mention it would eat up all of our funds. We would just have to green the space best we could around it.

We approached John Greenlee who is not only a parent in the district he is also a well known landscape architect, grass specialist and author. Despite his busy schedule he was able to develop plans for us that would help us green the space on a budget and guide us in remaining focused.


/ Saxon Holt

A little info on John:
http://www.timberpress.com/author/john_greenlee/1470
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/jan/31/garden-designer-john-greenlees-love-affair-grasses/

The Starting Point

Lipman Middle School located in Brisbane California was recently awarded a grant from Lowes Toolbox
for Education to make an outdoor classroom. While we had many fabulous ideas we also needed to work within our budget – and the overall courtyard needed to be improved at the school. We worked through several desires and realized the gap between what we wanted and what we could afford was huge.

Here are a few photos of what we were starting with: