Discretely nestled in a dark, coniferous forest on a narrow topographic bench, Shadowrock is located on the edge of small mountain town and at the toe of a craggy dolomite peak, an iconic feature of geological significance. After living on property for a decade, the family approached the team with a vision to transform an existing lawn into a colorful and interactive space, anchored by a new swimming pool. Instead of a simple geometric shape, however, family members sought to recreate an environment akin to a high alpine lake, inspired by the rugged beauty of naturally occurring tarns found throughout the Colorado Rockies. These small mountain lakes are often captured within boulder outcroppings at high elevations, possessing natural beauty through their unexpected and irregular forms.
Although its setting evokes the feeling of infinite wilderness, the physical limits—constrained on all sides by the home, guest cabin, and steep terrain—reduced to only 3,700 square feet in size. This intimacy challenged designers to reorganize and expand the program to consider function, microclimates, and visual interest, while maintaining the site’s innate tranquility. The garden design would interpret the story of the surrounding landscape—rockfalls, snowmelt streams, and perennial meadows—through a set of detailed portraits. Organized by two serpentine-like edges with a cantilevered diving platform, the pool stitches together a program, transforming the space into a recreational amenity. Movable furnishings enable the space to be modified for a range of functions. 55 monolithic boulders, each weighing between 1-3 tons, and 30 pallets of smaller slag material were obtained with the intent of precisely fitting them together. The outcroppings would cascade and dip beneath the water’s horizon, dictating water movement, creating coves and submerged ledges, and punctuating the water’s surface for moments of retreat.
As the team embarked on a traditional design process, the contractor conducted budget checks at critical milestones. However, masonry estimates gathered at the 50% construction document mark—a deliverable where bids typically reach competitive levels and are derived from highly detailed drawings—varied as much as 200%, revealing differing expectations associated with the fabrication. The process revealed that, while drawings and specifications are effective in communicating intent for manufactured materials, shortcomings arise when using non-standard construction media such as irregular boulders. To avert this challenge, designers pivoted to an alternative documentation process, one that leveraged emerging 3D technologies to interpret the story of the alpine garden in a manner that was both cost-effective and sustainable, and that closed the communication gap between landscape architect and contractor.
Through a deliberate use of technologies, the landscape architect instilled predictability into the design and construction process. To begin, the team developed a digital 3D model of the intended landscape water features. Structural walls and pool shotcrete thicknesses were accounted for to facilitate discussion of construction sequencing, boulder stabilization and owner understanding of design intent. This base model was then printed at 1:10. Next, the purchased landscape boulders were digitally scanned via photography. Several images were taken of each boulder from multiple angles. The boulders were tagged with an identification number to track them through the digitalization process and for later reference onsite during construction. A proprietary Autodesk program stitched together the boulder images to generate accurate 3D models printed with each boulder’s unique shapes, natural clefts, and granular texture. This allowed the design team to precisely place modeled boulders with intentional orientations on the base model. To improve communication of design details, the models were used in OAC meetings to glean design review and construction implementation feedback. After iterative rounds of design and constructability review, a final vision was documented for the site and construction documents were refined in response.
During construction, the typical approach to realizing such natural features requires the Landscape Architect to be present onsite and observe/direct construction crews at every step of the process: boulder selection, placement, positioning and guidance regarding cutting or other fabrication. This “trial-and-error” method is time intensive, technically challenging and mistake-prone. In addition, waiting until site observation to fully understand the art of boulder crafting usually results in costly field changes, more sub-contractor time and delayed project completion. In response, the redefined process enabled the contractor to organize and streamline installation, reducing construction time by 20%, costs by 12-15% and the landscape architect’s construction observation time by 60%. Perhaps most important, the process created a dynamic tool that invited the client to participate in the design, and ensured expectations between the landscape architect and client would be achieved.
Shadowrock Garden: Building Artfully Through Technology
Location: Rocky Mountains, Colorado, USA
Landscape Architect: Design Workshop, Inc.
Project Credits:
Design Workshop – Principal in Charge: Mike Albert, FASLA
Project Manager: Darla Callaway
Designers: Colten McDermott, Adam Mekies, Matt Moritz, Kevin Stewart
Pool and Spa Engineering: Water Design Inc.
Structural Engineering: KL&A
Civil Engineering: Roaring Fork Engineering
General Contractor: Brikor Associates Inc.
Landscape Contractor: Down to Earth
Stone Mason: Gallegos Corporation
3-D Boulder Printing: LGM 3D
Photography Credits: Brandon Huttenlocher/Design Workshop, Inc.
