Wynnewood yards work around old stone that has moved, mature trees, and water that stays.

Wynnewood is Lower Merion Township, zip 19096, and most of it was built out between the 1920s and the 1950s: stone singles, center-hall colonials, with twins and smaller singles closer to the avenue. Lot size is not uniform. Near Lancaster Avenue and Wynnewood Road the frontages are tight and the setbacks short, often a strip of lawn between sidewalk and step. Toward Penn Wynne and Wynnewood Valley the ground opens up, with deeper back yards, more slope, and street trees that have been there long enough to own the space above the property. Landscaping on those two ends of town is not the same job.

Two things drive most of the work here. The first is water. Indian Creek runs through this side of the township, and the low ground that feeds it does not dry out on its own. Downspouts that discharge at the foundation, back yards that sit lower than the street, and a patio laid flat instead of pitched all end up in the same basement. The second is age. Stone walls, steps and walks built eighty years ago have usually moved, because the base under them was thin to begin with and the frost has had eighty winters to work on it.

So the common jobs start with grading and drainage rather than anything decorative: bringing a back yard back to fall away from the house, rebuilding a walk with real base depth and pitch, resetting steps and a garden wall that have leaned out at the top. Bed renovation follows, because beds under mature trees are usually root-bound, shaded, and holding shrubs that outgrew the front of the house decades ago. Maintenance here means pruning, leaf work in November that a newer neighborhood never generates, and overseeding in September on lawns that get more shade than sun.