Retaining Walls in Portland, OR

Portland's west hills and sloped lots across the city make retaining walls more than a nice-to-have — they're what keep your hillside from sliding into your patio or foundation. Our Portland retaining wall service builds walls that actually hold back earth, with proper base, compaction, and drainage behind them so they stay straight for decades instead of bowing after one wet winter. We've built retaining walls across the Portland Metro Area since 1998, so we know what the city's clay soil and westside slopes do to a wall that's built wrong.

Water building up behind a wall is the number-one reason walls fail here — which is why every wall we build gets gravel backfill and a drainage path so hydrostatic pressure never builds against it. That's the part most crews shortcut, and it's the part that decides whether your wall lasts five years or fifty. We dig to firm ground, lay a compacted crushed-rock base, set the block or stone plumb and level, and backfill with clean gravel and a drainage outlet.

Portland retaining walls range from short garden-bed walls that tidy up a planting area to taller walls that carve a level lawn or patio out of a slope. We build in segmental block for most structural walls — interlocking, strong, and clean-faced — and natural stone or pressure-treated timber where the look or budget calls for it. We help you pick the material that lasts and matches the house, and we tell you up front what the whole build costs — base, drainage, materials, and haul-off.

A lot of our Portland work is replacing walls that another crew built without drainage, and that are now bowing or leaning. We tear them out and rebuild them right — base, compaction, drainage, and all — so you're not back here in five years looking at the same problem on a bigger lot. If your wall is starting to lean or you need a new one built to hold back a slope, give us a call and we'll come look at it.