In response to the brief from Andrea Bell of Pete Bossley Architects and the clients, designer Marg Thompson approached this project with restraint and simplicity. The impressive sixties-style new home with its imposing vertical cedar screen called for subtle bold planting and now floats above a sea of undulating Coprosma ‘Poor Knights’, interrupted with slashes of colour from strategically placed Strelitzia parvifolia. The adjoining boundary wall repeats the cedar screen with a grid of wires planted with Pyrostegia venusta. Tropical pool planting includes frangipani, Philodendron ‘Xanadu’ and Dypsis baronii. From the honed concrete patio a field of Lomandra nyalla enhances the outdoor living area and relegates the lawn mower to Trade Me.