We’re reducing our lawn two bricks at a time. Lawns, especially the high-maintenance sort treated with weed-killing fertilizers, have come under criticism in recent years because they provide nothing for pollinators or other native creatures. We don’t plan to ever get rid of all of it – it’s handy for walking and working in the garden – but the lawn is a much less dominant part of our landscape than it was in the 1970s and 1980s.
Let me explain the brick, first. When we had our house built in 1975, the town of Cape Elizabeth had just finished demolishing most of the buildings that made up Officers Row at Fort Williams. Anyone was free to pick up the remaining bricks, and we got a lot of them.
We used those bricks to create edges for our perennials borders, as well as to build a patio, walkways and our driveway. We like the look and the cost. Since then, I’ve sometimes found free bricks at the Cape Elizabeth transfer station.
Over time, we developed what we call a “kitty path” as edging to our perennial gardens. (When we had cats, they liked to walk on the bricks.) This path is three bricks wide, and the bricks are laid flat, level with the lawn on one side and the garden on the other side.
This means that, when I mow, I can run one side of the mower right along the outer brick and not have to return later to trim the edge lawn. Looking back, I wish the town had preserved those Officers Row structures. To get an idea of what they looked like, visit the Cape Eli.
