When drought-conscious homeowners started having their lawns removed, this was nothing new for us. We've been removing lawns for years. There's no special trick to it. It takes a strong back, a pick axe, and a truck. The truck is for taking the dead-lawn debris to the dump. These are all good reasons to hire the work out. A small lawn can be removed for $600 or so. It's worth every penny to have a blank slate.

The question then becomes now what. The first step is to prevent the old lawn from creeping back. Particularly if the lawn contained "crabgrass" or oxalis, all it takes is one good rain to bring the problem right back. Landscape fabric is the best solution. It's not a feel-good organic product; it is what it sounds like, fabric. But it does work. Layers of cardboard, now called "sheet mulching," is also effective.

Again you ask, "Now what?" From there you can go in 2 directions - softscape or hardscape. Softscape is plants. You can cut a hole in the fabric and plant any drought-tolerant plants you like. You can install a drip irrigation system, or you can choose plants like white sage or lamb's ears which can survive without regular water.

We've found one fine way to replace a lawn is to make a patio. That's the hardscape option. That's what is going on above. After the lawn came out and before the planting began, we built a couple of paths and started a small flagstone patio. Beneath the patio is fabric. On top of that is decomposed granite or DG. DG is the surface commonly used beneath brick, flagstone, or cobblestone. DG, which is essentially the new sand, can even be a very economical patio surface by itself.

While we recomend replacing a tired lawn with a classy blend of hardscape and softscape, we also always recommend mulch. Mulch is ground up tree bark and comes in many different sizes of wood chips. It not only increases plant health, it just looks nice. Mulch puts the finishing touch on your new non-lawn. Whether you are removing your lawn to save water or removing your lawn because you want something more creative, we applaud your decision and want to help.