Fountain Possibilities

Greetings El Presidio Homeowners and Blogger friends,

Today's post is an official one and a time for some decision making.  This past weekend, I took the time to go to the Ft. Lowell corridor for fountain ideas.  I also received some pricing on various things and spoke with some very friendly people.  I'm taking your past ideas, the landscape designer's plan, and my own eye for detail and putting all of this together.  I need your feedback on the central area.  The HOA gave me the green light to move forward on pricing and fountain options.  Here are some things I saw and along with each picture, I'll share with you several ideas.  Nothing is concrete or set in stone:)

Here's the space.  The central area is where the fountain will be placed.

First off, some of you may not be aware that El Presidio hired a landscape designer to come into our courtyard to write up a design for our now defunct pool.  We are saving a lot of money every month by not having this money consuming beast.  I'd like to assure homeowners that things are looking up and El Presidio is on the right track.  This past year we've made significant movement forward on the property and you all can look forward to several planned improvements like replacing rotted wood beams etc over the course of next year.  For our courtyard design, you can click on this link or see the HOA President(Shane) or myself for the larger prints.  The above pic is the space we're looking at and before any fountain is added to this spot, I would recommend one more tamper or "stamping down of the ground" to make sure all the soil has settled.  The proposed fountain would weigh a little over a ton.

Base styles.  Depending on our style choice will determine the overall cost.

Several things to consider are our beautiful oak trees.  They have begun to drop acorns and while the fountain doesn't take up the entire space, it is possible for leaf drop or acorns to enter any open water areas.  Pete, our landscape designer,  recommends a square base with a spherical cobalt blue water feature.  I searched and searched for the sphere needed and couldn't find the right one, but it doesn't mean there's not one out there somewhere.  I also could not find a pre-made square base.  This could be done by hand with flagstone.  The fountain will NOT be placed into the ground but rather above ground so that it attracts the eye once someone enters our courtyard area.  The space requires a 5 to 6 foot diameter base.  Here are several ideas that I found for people to think about.....

Here is a modified idea.  We could have a CIRCULAR premade base done by Zona Fountains.  They do not make square bases.  This also could be stained any color we choose.  We also have several outside base design choices. 

There are 3 parts to the fountain.  There is the actual artistic piece that will have water coming from it.  There is base that will have a planter for homeowners to put their seasonal flowers.  And there will be an above ground water basin that will collect the water and recycle it within the fountain.  There are several easy access panels to help clean out scum and other items.  Cleaning will be required from time to time and the HOA is aware of this extra cost.   We would use the BlueLake Fountain Reservoir for our larger artsy fountain piece.  We could keep the water fountain open as an open pot like above or utilize a sphere as suggested by our landscape designer.  The water fountain will have have to be leveled so that the water does not list from one side or the other.  In other words....balance.  Here are some more ideas.....

In the right color, this could be cool......

Or what about this?

This is interesting but it doesn't fit our space.  One homeowner was thinking about this style, but it would underwhelm the space.

  Of course there is the "pond" idea which is my favorite design, but it wouldn't flow with our courtyard style:)  When we purchase our second home, this will be something I'll pursue on my own:)

Here is the sphere idea, but I kinda like the open pot on the above pic. 

And what about clumping 3 different fountains together?  I've spoken with the people of Zona Fountains and Glazed Expressions.  Zona makes the base.  Glazed Expressions have our cobalt designs.  I went to Pottery Blowout on Grant and wasn't impressed with what I saw.  Installation and delivery vary for each place.  I have all the details, but it looks like the cost would be around 2500 dollars.  For the top pic with the closed reservoir base, we are looking at around 469 dollars for that piece and the cobalt pottery blue piece at $420.  The base, which we would have to purchase from Zona, would cost around 900 something depending on the material used.   Homeowners and blogger friends what do you think?  Here is one final pic that made me smile during this fun little adventure......I'd love to have one of these on my own property someday:)   This shot was taken at McConnell Nursery and Landscaping off of Ft. Lowell Rd.

So what's the next step?:)