Northpoint Residence

The owners called us after watching another firm propose a sweeping lawn and a swimming pool where, in our view, the property’s best feature was already growing. The oaks on the site are ninety years old. The brief, once we’d talked it through, was to do less, and to do it more carefully.

The principal intervention was restoring the stream that runs through the property. It had been channelized in the 1970s with concrete. We removed the concrete, re-graded the banks with reclaimed Litchfield fieldstone, and reintroduced native streambank plantings — sensitive fern, marsh marigold, jack-in-the-pulpit.

Beyond the stream, the forest floor is now blanketed in a moss-and-fern carpet, installed in 2,400 6-inch plugs over two seasons. The garden does not announce itself. It is the kind of work you walk past without noticing, until you realize you can’t stop looking.