Outdoor living space	entryway	Moorish garden

Cargill and Bradley Families DESERT LIVING COURTYARD

The Cargill and Bradley Families Desert Living Courtyard is divided into ten distinct garden vignettes, featuring a variety of landscape themes, each designed to demonstrate for homeowners new and creative ideas for using water-conserving plants in livable landscapes combining color, texture and function. Want to learn more about “gardening where we live?” Click here for an introduction and overall layout of the Courtyard or click on each of the garden vignettes to download the design layout and plant list.

Barrio Garden Layout and Plant List – peek behind the walls of one of Tucson’s traditional barrio gardens filled with bright colors, rusticated, recycled materials and unique containers

Container Garden Layout and Plant List – for the homeowner with limited space, containers provide many alternatives to in-ground plantings, including a “potted” water feature

Moorish Garden Layout and Plant List – reflecting the sensual tranquility of a shaded Moorish-inspired garden laid out around a cooling fountain in colors of blue, white and yellow

Xeriscape Garden Layout and Plant List – a demonstration of the classic principles of Xeriscape design clearly defining the “zone” concept and blending into the surrounding landscapes

Wildlife Garden Layout and Plant List – this boulder-strewn desert landscape features a shallow “natural” pond. Plants are selected for minimal water use and attractiveness to small wildlife

Dry Shade Garden Layout and Plant List – for those gardens with less than abundant sunshine, the spotlight here is on native and arid-adapted plants that thrive in partial or total shade

Winter/Summer Garden Layout and Plant List – garden beds filled with plants that bloom in either of Tucson’s most extreme seasons – the cold of winter or the heat of summer.

Meditation Garden Layout and Plant List – inspired by the simplicity of a Zen garden, this smallest of the ten vignettes demonstrates that even a tiny space can become a peaceful refuge with carefully chosen plant material and hardscape symbolizing the natural environment

Outdoor Living Garden Layout and Plant List – here architecture and plants combine to create a sense of place that is informal, comfortable, adapted to our desert surroundings, and inviting for year-round outdoor family living

Utility Garden Layout and Plant List
– a practical demonstration of gardening basics from tool storage and potting benches, to composting and low tech water harvesting, including a kitchen garden in a cattle tank