This is a picture facing left from the sliding door.

This post was edited by ksb1 on Mon, Oct 21, 13 at 13:56

patio will be on the left if you are facing the house.

closeup of the color
We also have french drains around the house, but he said he will slant the concrete away from the house and use new caps for the drains so they still work.

The photos don't provide a great grasp of your yard as they are taken from too close a vantage point and don't link well to each other.

The off-the-shelf patio design, for which you provide a link, has some readily identifiable weaknesses (looping footprint, dining set placement directly in the main traffic path & grill space that looks tacked on) that you should eliminate if you adapt it for your use.

I would not give too much weight to the paint color you have currently. It's possible that in a future paint job, it may be changed. For the most part, patio color choices -- colors or brick or stone -- will be compatible with any number of paint colors. I'd look for contrast instead of close matching. (Too much close matching can make it look like a government designed project.) You also might look for a color that is on the darker side. Sometimes, light colors can be blinding.

I say a warm brown color and a very simple pattern like herring bone. I hope that is not the patio lay out you will be using.

I see that the planned patio extends 29 1/2' from the back of the house. Do you have that much space from the house to the retaining wall?

How far will it be from the far side of the patio to the retaining wall, and what will you do in that space? I'm having difficulty imagining how the swirly patio edge will interact with the straight retaining wall. I think that before embarking on such an expensive project, you need a diagram of the entire backyard -- to scale -- so you can see how all the pieces will fit together.

Will you be removing all the lawn and replacing it with landscaping?
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When choosing a table and chairs, look for chairs which can be slid under the table. That will leave more room for walking around the table when the table isn't in use -- which will be the vast majority of the time.

Thanks.
Good point about the house possibly being painted a different color. I was thinking med to darkish browns, maybe with some reddish tones. I shouldn't have posted tthe patio design! Actually, I'm not using that design as is so it's very misleading. That was more to find a general shape for the circular portion.
- There will be no defined grill area.
- Table placement and square footage would be different. That picture comes from a website, posted as is.
- Concrete will go up to the house as we don't want plants near the house due to drainage issues. We will also probably put a concrete walkway around the perimeter for similar reasons.
- A big thing I left out - the circular portion would go up to the retaining wall and the retaining wall would curve for seating.
- This would cover a little less than half the yard. The rest would be grass and plants.

One other thing I meant to mention, but forgot, was to avoid stamped patterns that are highly textured, like cobblestone. They are more difficult to walk on and to keep furniture from rocking. "Brick" patterns are better in that regard.