"Mr. Silvers, was a trash collector and moved discarded treasures to the backyard of his lake home."

Even though his backyard was an eyesore, neighbors tell stories of this junkman with a heart of gold, a love for his community and “the nicest man you would ever meet.” After Mr. Silvers got emphysema, he wasn’t able to landscape using his junkyard discoveries.

The next door neighbor sold him a little strip of land to ride his tractor down his steep hill so he could still fly fish. As he was fly fishing, I am sure he would look at his backyard and wish he had the strength to create his dreamscape. Mr. Silvers died a few years ago and his relatives cried when they had to sell his beloved lake home rich with memories.

"Our friends looked at us like we were crazy when we bought Mr. Silvers’ manufactured home with a cracked foundation, a dirt floor basement, telephone poles failing to solve huge drainage issues and junk in the backyard."

However, we knew that this lake house could be transformed. Through a miraculous chain of events, we met Mario Da Silva when we were getting quotes for our concrete paver driveway.

Of all the contractors we interviewed for our driveway job, Mario seemed to immediately connect with our lake house and see the potential. It is hard to know when you are meeting contractors since everyone promises the moon but we both felt there was something special about Mario.

As Mario was transforming our driveway, we would have conversations about our backyard. We asked for a design just to have a plan to do in stages over the next few years. Our only immediate need was a little bit of clean up work.

"Mario's design saw beyond the overgrown junkyard to a park setting complete with waterfalls, koi pond, boulders, stone walls, flagstone walkways, bridges, and walking paths."

To refuse his design would be like rejecting a gift of Chihuly garden art. Of course we started our backyard project immediately.

"As Mario shaped his hardscape, he fulfilled Mr. Silvers’ dream by incorporating the junkyard telephone poles, granite rocks, railroad ties and cinder blocks on our property."

What a testimony to divine inspiration. There are literally thousands of hardscapers to choose from but there was only one choice for our backyard. Other hardscapers would have thrown away Mr. Silvers' junk, but Mario Da Silva found beauty in the abandoned treasures of a junkman.

BJ and Joe Mattarella
Marietta, Georgia