My move three years ago from a condo in downtown Santa Barbara to a home in the Goleta suburbs put me in charge of four patches of lawn right as the drought reared its devilishly dry head. I’ve kept the front lawns limping along on timed-sprinkler life support but have been more appropriately stingy with the backyard, where peninsulas of dirt and islands of yellow now outnumber the remaining bastions of green.
While drought-tolerant landscaping appeals, I still need places where our kids can run around, kick balls, and throw whatever without worrying about unnecessarily scraped knees and elbows. That leaves artificial grass as a primary solution, but that usually looks more like bad carpeting than a lush lawn. Not so anymore, says landscape designer Sean McLaughlin, who sold his first turf in 2000 and is now the regional distributor for Synthetic Turf Systems.
“There has been extensive engineering of turf to achieve something that not only looks realistic but has yarn that can stand up on its own without feeling rough,” said McLaughlin, who explained that today’s turf is softer, doesn’t heat up, and is under warranty for 15 years, though is built to last for much longer. Sales are bumping thanks to the drought, said McLaughlin, a former environmental engineer. “Our focus is on helping people become less water dependent by installing synthetic turf,” he said. “But we also help them in this vein by designing low-water- use landscapes.”