Decks for outdoor living - includes related article on decks for outdoor dining

Sunset, Spring-Summer, 1996 by Peter D. Whiteley

Gracious spaces for alfresco get-togethers

Decks reflect the Western tradition of using gardens as extensions of our homes. Well-designed decks can transcend even the most lopsided sites by creating level areas that extend living space, add room for entertaining, and bring the garden's beauty closer. The decks shown on these pages accomplish all these feats quite neatly while leaving plenty of growing room for plants.

A DECK AND A PATIO MEET GRACEFULLY

Wooden decks and flagstone patios are familiar surfaces for landscaping, but they rarely meet as gracefully as they do in Patty and Hal Hawthorne's back garden. The fluid meeting of wood and stone draws together what had been a fragmented yard.

The deck surface is made of red lauro, a durable Brazilian wood that combines the sturdiness and weathering characteristics of teak with the color of redwood. Metal deck clips secure the 1-by-6 decking to pressure-treated girders, leaving the surface unmarred by nails; only an existing pineapple guava tree pokes through it. Along the deck's back and outside edges, broad built-in benches add seating.

The flagstone-covered portion serves mainly as a sinuous path. From a sliding glass door in the living room, the Arizona chocolate flagstone flows outward, leading ultimately to a gazebo.

A DECK THAT GETS AN A IN GEOMETRY

Geometric shapes pattern the surface of this ground-level deck, which serves both as a boardwalk and as an entertainment space. The deck breaks into two paths around a rear garden. The main one, shown in the photo above, runs the length of the house, then grows into a creekside deck. The other leads from the parking area to the kitchen door.

With so much of the garden covered with wood, it could have seemed monotonous. But that's where geometry comes in. Whole and partial hexagons pattern the 64-foot-long deck. A concrete hexagon starts the pattern. But as the plan above shows, the deck's design relies on more than interconnected hexagons. It breaks them into triangular components and rearranges them to form other geometric shapes. (A chop, or miter, saw was used to make the many angled cuts in the decking.)

Keeping the deck low to the ground required a precisely laid out network of beams mounted on sunken piers. Under the decking, joists run from the base to the sides of each triangle.

While most decks use softwood 2-by-4s and 2-by-6s for the top layer, this one uses 1-by-6s made from a rot- and insect-resistant South American hardwood called ipe. Ipe starts out with a warm red tone and weathers to silver-gray. The wood is imported by XYLO-Pacific Hardwoods, Box 2297, Sunnyvale, CA 94087.

RELATED ARTICLE: DECKS THAT MAKE DINING OUT EASY

Foldaway buffet table

Side-by-side tabletops swing into action as sidebar buffets when it's time for an outdoor meal on the deck of this house in Woodside, California. The two 27- by 84-inch surfaces, made of 2-by-2s edge-glued together, are mounted on hinges attached to a 2-by-4 secured to a wall. Swing-out arms support the tops. When not in use, the tabletops hang unobtrusively below a set of windows and blend with the adjacent redwood siding. Design: Rob Hauck of Mr. Deck, Mountain View, California.

Picnic table alcove

A dining alcove projects from the side of this redwood deck. It has built-in benches along its angled sides. There's additional seating on movable benches, which, like the picnic table, stand on legs made from rectangles of 4-by-4s. Design: Waterman & Sun, Palo Alto, California.