I built a $50,000 landscape with just $5,000

Good morning one and all. My name is Stan Genetic. I've been a landscape hardcape contractor for 354 plus years. And today I'm going to give away some of my bestkept secrets. And what you're going to see me do today in this video is actually practice what I preach. It's going to be a fun video, but it's going to be a transformational video both in what we do outside and how we internalize, how we think about a project like this. So, let's just dive right into this one and go get this ride started. Franken Beans is enclosing the steps right now. This was actually the excess. I love working with Frankie cuz he's as picky as I am about different things. So, you see these posts right here? This post, what was the measurement on it, Frankie? >> 6x6. They actually were 6x6, but the first ones we used were 5 by 5 1/2 x 5 1/2. So I took a/2 inch off >> of every He didn't You didn't take a half inch off. You you >> Well, yeah, but by the time I was done, I cut all four sides. >> You shaved this much off from every side of the board so that it would look exactly the same size as the other post. And now he's reusing these to enclose the stairs. All right, guys. One of the things I have said over and over again is practice your craft at your own place, at your family's place, at your relatives or friends, anybody that will allow you to. And this is my house. And what you're looking at right here, what I call this is it used to be a pass through area. There was absolutely no point, no purpose, no intention to this zone whatsoever. It was so freaking ugly that it was a heads down zone. Heads down means you walked from one area to the other. You put your head down and you tried not to see all of the ugliness around you. What used to happen was we would come from here down these stairs, walk through this sidewalk, walk up another set of stairs to get to the other side. And that was the only point to this area. And one of the things that we're going to do today is we're going to do this landscaping here that you see, but we're going to do it on next to no budget whatsoever. We are going to get We're going to use free stuff. We're going to use stuff we find. All of these plants found them. Free found them. Uh the rocks, the boulders, the stones, free found them. The wood in the deck. We're going to do some crazy stuff with the wood in the deck. You're going to see it right away. Um, even the handrailing, I'm going to break all of this down. None of this was go to the store, spend a premium dollar, buy the premium materials, and bring it back. None of it. Boulders like this came from my fire pit. They were buried. You got to think outside of the box. So, today I'm going to explain to you what I did, how I did it all, and why. [Music] That's my kind of redneck genius ingenuity that I absolutely freaking love. [Music] So on a project like this, there is a combination of some new elements, but a lot of it is just old stuff. Um, but everything has the potential to become something even more. Let's just, for example, you may be thinking, "What the hell are you talking about, Dermaky?" Even how you stack the wood can become artistic in a way that adds into the overall look of a project. And I've said to you, practice your landscaping at friends or family's homes because creativity is a muscle. It's something that if you don't use it, you will lose it. And if you are a landscaper, thinking outside of the box is something that it just has to become status quo because every job that we do is going to be different. Let's take a look at some of the some of the materials I've used. Old logs. This was a tree on my property. Now these old logs are benches. Me and my granddaughter sit up there and we look out over the field here. Firewood. Firewood becomes art. As we come in and we look here, we're seeing old stones that I pulled out of a fireplace to accentuate old retaining walls that already existed. All of these plants, well, they were off from a they were just scraps off from a job that we were going to run these over. These would have just been excavator uh byproducts gone gone away. And as we come into here, I was thinking, how do I utilize this space and change this space to create a dedicated oasis? We needed to have focal points. But the focal point had to come from, this is where it gets really critical. You, your focal point has to come from the house. Where are you going to look at it the most? And this is something I try to train my uh customers to think because they always inevitably want to put this landscape way far out into the to the weeds where they think they're going to go visit. So, it's almost like an oasis away from home, but inevitably they don't. They don't visit those oasis away from home. Those places that when I'm building something way far out there, you'd be surprised at how often they get used. It's next to never after the initial excitement wears off. But when you're in your own home and you're looking down, you still see it. And when you still see it, I want my customers not to look at those landscapes with any regret, with any trepidation, with with any remorse. I want them to look at it and still feel that overwhelming excitement, knowing that they've placed their landscape in the right spot. Here, it's a fundamental different way of thinking when you're designing a landscape. So, as I'm building this area out, I'm looking at it from a couple of different areas. Where am I going to be viewing this from? I'm going to be viewing it from the home, and I'm going be viewing it primarily from two places outside of the home. One will be here. So, I want to optimize the viewpoint from this point. So, as I come here, I wanted to have something to look down on and appreciate what I had going on. And I didn't want this to be a pass through zone anymore. I wanted this to have a feel like it had a purpose and a point. Now, it was a pass through zone, but by taking the time to build this at my own property, I'm now refining the skills it takes to create a dedicated zone. So when I go to a customer's house, I can use this as an example, but more importantly, I have this in my knowledge bank of, hey, I've done this here, I've done that there. I can take different elements and apply them differently for my customers. So let's do a little bit of a walk through and the thought process that it takes. So you're sitting here at the pond, you're enjoying it, and you want to go into the house. So, you walk onto the deck here, which becomes a dedicated zone. And as you're hanging out on the deck, you've got your grill. You've got another area down here. Now, the sauna becomes its own dedicated let's walk down there. But when you're down there, you need to have some other focal point besides just being the sauna. So, I wanted to make this a dualpurpose zone. So, we have the table and we have a propane grill down here. So now this becomes a place where you go with intention. Now I didn't want to remove some of the elements that I had in place. So I had this sidewalk here, but I did no longer needed that sidewalk. Here's the thing. I eliminated the stairs. Hello, Mr. Blue Jay on my bird feeder. Thank you for coming and visiting. I had the dead I had the stairs here, but I wanted to update those stairs. I wanted to give them this fresh look. So Frankie and I took some old wood that we had in storage to build this staircase. But now we have a staircase alongside of another staircase, which makes zero sense. So what do we do with it? We turn the sidewalk into a dedicated zone for the outdoor shower. So, as we come over here, we come here, we can grab this. And now we have an outdoor shower. So, when we're done with the sauna, we've got a spot to come into. Here's Uncle Fogy. This is a bonsai. Now, it looks terrible right now, but you've got to break an egg to make an omelette. Meaning that this thing, you'll see me planting this. You'll see me working on this. But what's going to happen is this is all different varieties of low growing plants and these this will fill in around this bonsai giving it a lush green multicolored effect. I don't need to fill it in right now because part of the fun with the landscape project is watching things progress. It doesn't necessarily have to be about instant satisfaction. It can be about a process of evolution and watching things grow and shape and continually coming out into your area and just appreciating everything that you've been able to accomplish whether you've done it or whether you've had someone else do it. But as we look at this, a lot of this these materials are nothing more than recycled materials that I pulled out of separate places. So creating a zen oasis does not necessarily mean you have to break the bank to do it. So here's the other focal point. As we come up, we take a look. We reuse this wood. But here's where you look at it from up above. So from this point, this was the other area that I really wanted this to look nice. So you can see that I created the focal point from this zone and from that zone. And then once you're down there, it's not too far from the other structures to make it feel like a journey, to make it feel like it's completely separated, but it's close enough that you'll be able to utilize it. And once you're down there, it feels like there's a purpose to that zone. Did I breathe during that entire thing? I don't know. I just said a lot of words. Let's just keep this video going. free hostas. Customer of ours gave me a whole truckload of hostas. To create those circular wood stacks and have them still fit into the sauna itself, it's a wood burning sauna. We have to take our normal firewood and cut it down into much smaller pieces. So, I've got Zach back by the woods splitter getting that all ready. All right. Well, we got stones to install. And if I don't get them hostas put in, those are going to cack, too. So, [Music] >> did that one just break? >> Yep. I just broke it. I threw it down and it should have been fine, but one corner caught the other stone and it snapped the entire thing into a fraction. So, flip now. What? Wow. Just don't break the next one is what my head is telling me. [Music] I'm going to go first. I'm going >> flipping it upside down. >> Nope. Going to go right here. Go right here. Right there. That's it. These are stones off from a scrap pile and I have a very few of them. So, I've got them build with intention as I'm laying these out. Hot. It's humid. They might as well be the freaking jungle in Minnesota. All right, where we at? We got the free hostas are in the stones. They don't make sense yet. They don't make sense yet. Look at Frankie's handrailing. That's the whole character of the deck right there. Then we've covered up the stairs in dirt. A lot of people are like, "It's stupid." Yep, I don't care. Here it's covered up in dirt and now it's starting to get planted. So the entire staircase below it will get planted underneath it. But this is all still in the omelet making stage. We got to break eggs and make omelets. And now >> eggs to make an omelette. We've broken this this omelette 50 times to make this omelette. >> Yeah. Well, this is a new omelette. This >> This is a new omelette. >> This is a new kind of omelet. So all right. Well, we're going to watch Zach stack wood while I do whatever it is I do. And if you people don't think I work hard, here's my camera hand right here. And that's washed off so I can hold the camera. So the sauna that you see in this video is a wood burning sauna. And that means I've got to have wood stacked up. And usually nothing is uglier than stacks of wood just randomly sitting around in someone's yard. Unless you stack the wood like we stack. So now this becomes functional art. The wood itself becomes part of the landscape statement that doesn't cost anything other than the time it takes to intricately stack this thing. And that means even my piles of wood become part of the landscape. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Didn't that look nice? The I like the color turned out really nice. >> Yeah. Like like kind of orang-ish cedarish look cuz it's all over overseated. >> Yeah. But it blended in nice. >> Oh yeah. >> Yeah. It turned out great. Okay. But we still got a real mess over here. So, um, what we're trying to do is create kind of like a zen oasis area down here, but on a budget, right? So, we're going to be recycling as much material as we can and when we we're going to buy what we got to buy when we got to buy it. But, I'm not going to be going and and and spending, you know, buku bucks on some >> big freaking uh thingamabob to make this area pop. It's just it's out of the question. So, the thing we're going to try to do next is is plant Uncle Fogy. >> I have no clue what the heck that is. >> Most people probably don't. So, I was looking for something down here, Zach. We've got this as kind of like your the reason to be down here. Right. >> Right. Well, once you get down here, is there another focal point that we can get so that we can kind of create the the finish the the feel? Um, so as I'm looking at this, you don't have to come up with the answer, Zach. This this I pondered this for a long time, what I could do here, clean this up. We're going to fix this up, but that's not today's project. Today's project is for the first time ever. I'm going to try to plant a bonsai. Since I'm a bonsai noob, I did chat GPT and I got some ideas and I've been watching bonsai videos and it's just nothing more than a visual centerpiece. But I want to show you Uncle Fogy. Usually they're in tiny little pots and stuff. >> Yeah, but you can create bonsai for outdoor structures as well. They don't have to be in a pot. I mean, maybe technically I'm no bonsai expert, so I'm not claiming to know. I'm just going to have some fun with a cool looking tree. Let's just put it that way. Now, that's a weird tree. Yeah, that's a jackpine. That's from I grew up in northern Minnesota. This is called an Uncle Fogy jackpine. And it only gets a couple feet tall, but it gets like 15, 20 feet wide or some crazy thing like that. >> We're We're just going to have spikes every so often. It's just going to be this tree growing sideways. >> Yeah. So, we're going to have some fun. We're going to try to get that planted, but let's go see if we can. So, part of a bonsai, we need to have something else in the ground to um to go along with it. So, let's go see if we can't find something somewhere to make it pop. We need a rock. You know, you got bonsai. Bonsai have rocks in front of them. >> Yeah. >> You got to put a rock in it. >> We need a rock, but not just any rock. We don't want an old Minnesota field stone. We want something that maybe is a little better. I was thinking that bad boy. pull him out of the burn pit or one of these two over here. So, we're going to crack open the excavator. We're going to pull these three out and take a look at them. You don't feel like old Amishing it by hand and some pickaxes and >> Why? >> I know, right? We have modern technology. >> Yeah. Well, let's get her fired up and get three boulders out and see what they look like. Heat. [Music] took the excavator off of it and it decided it wanted to sit right like we wanted I think what we'll do is we'll bring it in like this and we'll try to get it set in place just like that over there. Yeah, it's actually the kind of space we're used to working in when we work in the cities, twin cities, right? There's no no big loss, no open space, >> right? Huh? Oh, I got plenty of turn radius. Now watch. After I say we're used to doing that, I'm going to crush something. You're going to just I hopefully at least crush a rock before we crush the deco is Frankie is going to be upset. >> Frankie will hurt me. >> He will. >> He will harm my soul. >> Forward a little bit too. want Little more. Yeah, you got about six more inches and then then you're on and then that's what all you got. almost flat. >> So, as we look at it, let's just look at what I'm looking for. We got the aggregate. You can see how it retains its shape. So, this is going to give us the ability to put it into a mound >> to craft it into the shape, mold it the way we want it, and then it'll hold its shape while it's uh starting to become a growing. you know, what it doesn't have enough organic material in it to be a growing medium in and of itself, but it has enough uh stability to it that'll allow us to create the shape we want instead of putting like a sand or a grally in and then the first ranchers go >> Oh, yeah. >> and you got a flat spot with a mud hole, right? >> So, the point with getting a bonsai in the first place is to create a dedicated zone for the bonsai to live in. And that means I want to create a mound shape to accent accentuate the bonsai itself. It's not a tall growing bonsai, but it'll give it'll draw the eye to it by creating the mound. And of course, every mound, every bonsai, you always see rocks placed around it. So, we're just going to harvest some soil that we have on site. Do >> not trust. >> Is that got good charge on it, or did you grab the bun with no charge on it? I don't think I'd be able to make it all the way over here if it had no charge. This one's got pretty good charge on it. >> Good. All right. All right. So, we're going to start creating the mound. [Music] The soil that we have on hand and on site already existing is claybased soil. So, I'm creating the landscape based on knowing the type of soil that I get to work with, something that will retain its shape. Now, if I didn't have soil that would naturally retain its shape, I would have to modify my landscape to be able to utilize whatever I have on hand. So, I'm not stuck with just any one design. I'm modifying the design to optimize and make it work with the type of materials that I have available. [Music] I think we got the general shape. Let's get Uncle Fogy in so we can get the rest of it kind of dressed up and taken care of. >> I think I think that's our spot. So, cuz this will grow this way. >> And then you can always Well, bonsai is about training it. So, yeah. So, you can train it to do whatever you want. >> And the bridge will grow this way. Angle it my way just a titch. Yep. There you go. There you go. I think that's it right there. I think that's what we're going to do. It'll grow away from the stairs. you know, grow into this zone. The sunlight is this way. She's going to want to naturally come this way. We've still got clearance on the seat. If it grows up, which these don't get very big, but if it when it does, we've got a rope bridge that could potentially go right here. We've got clearance. That's the spot. All right. Mark it with an X and put it in the oven for baby and me. [Music] Hey, hey. [Music] Okay, this is about as ghetto as it gets. Don't care. We went down to our yard and I picked all the moss off from the building. So, this was all growing right next to the building. In fact, these are paint chips. Son of a duck. So, I got to try to get all the paint chips out of that and stick it up in there. Not everything works. Now, I was hoping to get this moss to grow and spread underneath Uncle Fogy. That would be my perfect scenario. I just went and picked it up off from the side of an old building and I wanted it to grow in, but Uncle Fogy needs more sunlight and that moss needs less sunlight and those two things don't co coexist. So instead, I've got some other plants to grow in between and I'll use that moss just as an underllayment. Now, the landscape that you seen in this video did not cost $5,000. It didn't even come close to that much. But if I…