Retaining Walls in Wildwood, MO

The Steepest Part of the County

Wildwood incorporated in 1995 to keep western St. Louis County rural, and it's the county's roughest ground: wooded ridges around Rockwoods Reservation, hollows running down toward the Meramec, and lots measured in acres rather than feet of frontage. Houses sit on pads cut into hillsides, reached by long driveways that climb or drop through the trees.

The soil changes too. The loess that covers the uplands closer in thins out here over cherty, rocky ground. A trench might hit solid limestone a foot down, or broken chert sitting on clay, and those two call for very different bases.

Driveway Cuts and House Pads

Walls in Wildwood tend to do structural work. A driveway cut into a slope needs something to hold the cut face, and a house pad needs something holding the fill on its downhill side. Walls under a driveway carry car loads as well as soil, which often rules out plain block and brings in poured concrete or an engineered block design with longer grid.

Where the wall is part of the landscape rather than holding up a drive, boulder walls in native-looking limestone blend in with the woods.

Other Work Here

Access comes first on almost every Wildwood job: steep drives, big trees near the work, and soft ground after rain. Shaded wooded slopes stay wet, so drainage matters. Entries sometimes call for cut stone, and older driveway walls come up for repair or a full rebuild.

Wildwood Retaining Wall FAQs