Scruffy to Sensational: A Garden Retreat in Encinitas

TIME: Less than two years. COST: About $5,000.

Alix Olson’s 35x19-foot Encinitas yard was weedy with an ugly chain-link fence. She built a patio with French doors, watered grass, planted bougainvillea to hide the fence. Then added a garden along the fence, visiting nurseries with a friend. Realizing the hard clay soil had no drainage, she ripped everything out except bougainvillea and a happy Australian willow. Attacked crabgrass, rototilled, added amendments, installed watering system, pond with solar waterfall, flagstone path with chamomile and thyme between pavers. Daily plucked crabgrass sprouts. Now: “I have become a gardener. I can’t stop.”