Raised Timber Planting Beds and Retaining Walls - Backyard Inspiration

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In this month's This Old House magazine (photo above), I've drawn some inspiration for our 2012 backyard landscape design plans.  I've long desired to install a series of raised beds/planters that will add some dimension and height to our small backyard, and the article about how to "stretch a small yard", which includes a few of said raised beds, is another nudge towards getting these started.

In my mind these were going to be more ornate: either with shingles on the sides or maybe even stone veneer.  But, after seeing these simple 6X6 landscape timber walls/boxes, I think I've now settled on going this route.    I can see them going up in a bunch of places in the back, but as with most projects that I take on, there tends to be 'scope creep'.  Have to be careful to not take on too much, so I'm going to (hopefully) just focus on getting one planter/wall installed.  Maybe other ones next year?

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