Hardscape Services in Los Angeles

The Culver City brick walkway job, step by step

See every step of the Culver City job

1. The starting point. The existing brick path had been slipping for years - the base had failed, bricks had shifted, and every rainy season water stood on it. But the rusty, aged character was exactly what the homeowner loved. Our job was to rebuild the function without losing that look.
2. Demo in progress. We pulled up the failing walkway carefully and stacked the old bricks. Some were reusable, but we needed far more matching brick than the existing supply could give us.
3. Forklift loading a pallet of reclaimed brick at a salvage yard. Finding the right rusty-toned brick to match a decades-old walkway meant visiting 10-15 yards across the LA area. New brick would have looked wrong next to the original.
4. When you find the right batch, you pack them however you can. Model X trunk floor-to-roof in reclaimed brick, protective plastic underneath. The hunt was the hard part - getting them home was the easy part.
5. Raking the sub-base smooth for the mortar bed. The underlying ground had been settling for years because a tree had been removed from that spot and the root mass decomposed over time. We added clean dirt and compacted it in lifts, then rebuilt the base.
6. Relocating sprinkler heads around the cactus bed. The original irrigation was under the walkway path - we capped, re-ran, and tested each head so the landscape still gets water after the bricks go in.
7. Our rotating laser level set up over the prepped path. We use this to verify the drainage slope across the full 300 sqft run - every brick has to sit on a grade that sheds water cleanly without being obvious underfoot.
8. Mason strings stretched above the freshly screeded base. These guide every brick to the right height and alignment so the walkway reads straight even where the path follows a curve.
9. Partially complete walkway. Once the border course is set and the field starts filling in, the whole path starts to read. You can see the slight rusty tone variation across the reclaimed bricks - exactly the look we were after.
10. Almost finished: the walkway sweeping through the backyard toward the Spanish-style home.
11. Finished walkway leading to a green wooden door of the Spanish-style cottage. Succulents and cacti hold the bed line. The new path ties the home, the landscape, and the existing backyard character into one coherent piece.
12. Wider view of the finished walkway curving through the yard toward the patio. The walkway was extended beyond the original footprint so moving through the backyard is genuinely easier now. No pooling after rain, no shifting bricks, and the original rusty character preserved.

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Permits and Inspections

Whether a job like this needs a permit depends on your city and the work; we check the rules for your job before we start. The permits that can apply:

• Grading permit (for significant elevation changes)
• Building permit (for retaining walls over 3-4 feet)
• Encroachment permit (for work near property lines or sidewalks)

• Small patio projects may be exempt from permits
• Retaining walls often have specific height and setback requirements
• We verify requirements with your local building department
• HOA approval may be required for front yard hardscape