No fences make good neighbors / Berkeley residents combine their backyards -- and a community is born

(L2R) Wanda Westberg and her neighbor Austene Hall in the yard. Wanda Westberg and her Berkeley neighbors around her all agreeing on taking down the fences in their yards creating a giant open space and gardens for every one to see. THURSDAY, MAY 24, 2007 KURT ROGERS BERKELEY SFC THE CHRONICLE FENCES_0054_kr.jpg MANDATORY CREDIT FOR PHOTOG AND SF CHRONICLE / NO SALES-MAGS OUT less (L2R) Wanda Westberg and her neighbor Austene Hall in the yard. Wanda Westberg and her Berkeley neighbors around her all agreeing on taking down the fences in their yards creating a giant open space and ... more Photo: KURT ROGERS Photo: KURT ROGERS Image 1 of / 7 Caption Close No fences make good neighbors / Berkeley residents combine their backyards -- and a community is born 1 / 7 Back to Gallery

The first time that painter Wanda Westberg and her husband, Richard Pettler, looked at the Berkeley brown shingle house they bought in 1997, Westberg hated it.

But, she loved the openness of the backyard, even though it was a tangle of trash, concrete and crabgrass choking in a forest of plum trees. Westberg imagined a yard that might look more like a park than a garden.

But first, she thought, the metal-mesh fence that delineated her backyard from the five yards that met her property line would have to come down.

"Nobody had fences in South Dakota, where I grew up," she said. "My backyard was an oasis of safety that gave me perfect freedom as a kid. One neighbor had a tree house, one a tire swing and another a playhouse. It didn't make sense for each parent to go out and buy the same things when we could share."

After talking to her neighbors, Westberg used wire cutters, pruning shears and determination to remove the rusty 4-foot-tall fence and its snarled mass of ivy and blackberry brambles. Out came the fence and in came the expanded views.

Taking down the fence had another outcome: She established a more communal relationship with her neighbors. No longer playing in tree houses, Westberg, Pettler and their neighbors share barbecues, garden tips and a glass of wine at sunset, all accomplished without the formality of front doors.

"When Wanda called to tell me she wanted to take down the fence, I thought it was a strange idea," said Sally Sklar, Westberg's neighbor to the right. "I didn't want to be rude and say no, but I didn't want to say yes, either. I told her, 'Good fences make good neighbors.' "

Sklar and her husband, Bernie, have lived in their house for more than 30 some years, but Sklar had never paid much attention to her backyard. Having grown up in apartment buildings in Philadelphia, she didn't have an interest in gardening and hadn't given a second thought to the fence. But Westberg eventually persuaded Sklar that the removal of the fence would be an asset.

"Wanda has increased the pleasure of our lives by taking down that fence," Sklar said. "When Bernie and I sit on our patio, we see a scene straight out of Provence."

A bit of strategic thinking and shared planning was needed before the fence on Westberg's left side could come down. Her neighbors -- Austene Hall, Bob Archibald and Eleanor Gibson -- liked the idea, but there were two problems: They owned a dog and they maintained an English-style garden that the deer would munch to nubs in a week. Together, they came up with a plan to build a low, welcoming fence with a gate.

Gibson, Hall's 80-year-old mother, is a New York master gardener who moved into a cottage overlooking the garden. They all aspire to Gibson's knowledge and know-how. Though Hall and Gibson often work in the garden together, Gibson frequently works in the steeply sloped garden and Westberg feels good knowing that she could easily assist Gibson should she fall.

Westberg also removed the fence that ran along the back of her property, where her neighbors Bill and Polly Halloran plan to remove the trellises between the yards. The Hallorans enjoy the connected gardens from their second-floor deck.

When Westberg and Pettler moved in, the sloped section of the yard was barely accessible. For the garden's hardscape, they found inspiration in a 1938 National Park Service design book and installed natural-looking Coldwater Canyon rock steps that now lead to a small lawn surrounded by mounds of manzanita, Mexican sage and yarrow. A second set of steps was installed to meander up to the gate, which is covered by variegated jasmine and California Dutchman's pipe (which Gibson calls Dutchman's britches). Clusters of yellow roses hover on the pergola above the gate. A walnut tree and a hawthorn tree anchor the back of the yard, and a healthy magnolia, once choked by a plum tree that Westberg has since removed, spreads out "like a harp."

To reflect her preferred palette as a tonalist painter, Westberg planted California natives. "I like the muted colors of a California landscape. In my paintings, I rarely apply cadmium red or ultramarine blue directly to a canvas. Most earth tones have to be mixed," she said.

The colors in her yard also harmonize with the inside of her home, which she and Pettler have restored and furnished in the Arts and Crafts style. (She now loves the inside of her home, too.) The Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association awarded the couple its 2005 Preservation Award for their restoration efforts.

Westberg gave her backyard room to breathe and grow, and it sounds as if she's doing the same with her neighbors.

"My neighbors and I are close, but a situation like this wouldn't work without respecting each other's property and privacy," she said while ushering a visitor into her kitchen. She had work to do. The next day she was having an outdoor potluck that her neighbors were, of course, attending.