We’re returning to Valley View, an 11-acre property in northern Delaware where Danilo and the Maffei Landscape Design team are developing a master plan that connects the home, gardens, and surrounding woodland into one cohesive experience. In earlier updates, we looked at the larger vision for the property: the arrival courtyard, the vanishing water feature, the rear terraces, the woodland edge, and the way the landscape will gradually shift from structured and architectural near the home to more naturalistic as it moves outward.
Now, the project is entering its next important phase: design development.
This is where the big ideas from the schematic plan begin to become more specific. The overall layout has been established. The team has studied how the property will be used, how people will move through it, where the driveway, patios, gardens, and gathering spaces will go, and how the landscape can make the best use of the site’s natural topography.
Design development asks the next set of questions. What materials will actually be used to build the project? What will the paving feel like underfoot? How will the water feature be constructed? What will the walls, fences, terraces, and planting beds look like in real life?
Read the other parts of this series below:
- Part 1 – Valley View: A Forever Home Rooted in Nature
- Part 2 – Inside the Valley View Project: The Art of Concept Development
- Part 3 – Designing the Moments: How Valley View Will Feel to Live In
FROM CONCEPT TO MATERIALITY
Schematic planning is about solving the larger spatial puzzle. Design development is about giving that solution texture, dimension, and detail.
For Valley View, that means moving from broad ideas into the specific material language of the property. The arrival courtyard becomes a question of paving, stone, water, planting, proportion, and construction. The terraces become places defined by grade changes, walls, views, and the way someone will sit there at different times of day.
Danilo is thinking through these pieces carefully before they are documented in CAD. As always, they begin by hand, using trace paper, pens, scales, and sketches to work through the design problems before translating them into more technical drawings.
DESIGNING THE WATER FEATURE IN DETAIL
One of the key design moments at Valley View is 
But a feature like this is not something pulled from a catalog. It has to be designed specifically for this site.
During design development, the team is studying how the stone will be shaped, how the water will move, how the reservoir will function, and how the entire feature will sit within the arrival garden. The goal is for the finished piece to feel effortless, but getting there requires a careful understanding of construction, proportion, and detail.
This is the element the family will see from the kitchen window. It is the piece that will greet them when they arrive home. It should feel calm, grounded, and deeply connected to the surrounding garden.
RETHINKING WALLS AND GRADE CHANGES
Another important part of the process is studying how the landscape responds to the architecture and the site’s changing grades.
At Valley View, the team has been collaborating with the architect and civil engineer to understand finished heights around the garage and how those elevations relate to the surrounding ground. Early in the process, one idea was to use a stone masonry wall with a more sheer, architectural character.
But as the design evolved, the team began to realize that a boulder wall would be a better fit for this particular location.
That shift matters. A stone masonry wall would have created a more formal architectural edge. A boulder wall gives the grade change a more natural, grounded feeling, better suited to the woodland setting and the way the property transitions from structured spaces near the home into a softer landscape beyond.
Before documenting that decision in CAD, the team studies it by hand. How might the boulders be stacked? What should the overall dimensions be? How does the wall feel in relation to a person standing nearby?
BUILDING A PLANTING PALETTE WITH PURPOSE
The planting design follows a similar process. There are hundreds of plants that could technically work on a property like this, but the right palette has to do more than survive. It has to support the mood and purpose of each space.
For Valley View, the team is returning to the ideas developed during the schematic phase. What is the feeling of each part of the garden? What will the homeowners see when they are sitting on the terrace or gathering near the fire pit lawn? What happens when they look out toward the woods in the afternoon? Will the grasses be backlit? Will the garden feel soft and glowing?
From there, the team begins organizing the planting by themes. One planting theme may belong to the rear garden, another to the arrival area, and another to the garage and retaining wall area. Each zone has its own role, but all of them need to feel connected.
The design team starts by selecting a few core plants for each area, then builds combinations around them. Once those combinations feel strong, they can be developed further in CAD and organized into plant palettes that show how the plants will work together throughout the year.
WHAT’S NEXT
Design development is where a landscape begins to move from possibility into reality. The big ideas are still there, but now they are being tested, refined, and translated into buildable details.
At Valley View, that means studying the construction of the water feature, refining walls and grade changes, developing planting themes, and making sure every material choice supports the larger vision for the property.
We’ll continue sharing updates as Valley View moves through design development and closer to becoming a landscape that can be lived in, walked through, and enjoyed season after season.