At a design review board meeting in the coastal California city of Goleta on Aug. 11, residents both online and in person expressed concern about a new 50-foot water tower going up in town. It was too tall. It would block views. And it could even be dangerous to the health of those around it. 

Except it wasn’t a real water tower. The wooden structure would masquerade as one type of infrastructure, when it was in fact another — an AT&T cell tower, cleverly disguised, that would improve service in an area rife with spotty reception.

This water tower at 167th St. in Llano, Calif., is a disguised cellphone tower.

Since these concealed cellphone towers were introduced in the early 1990s, the debate over their going up has played out countless times in towns across the U.S. Most often, they’re built anyway. A cell tower is installed somewhere in town, camouflaged as a pine tree, a flag pole or a water tower, or even hidden away in a building, often as mandated by city code. The concealment works only to a point and thus has been the subject of ridicule, especially online, with one comedian referring to them as “tree drag.”

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One company is responsible for much of that concealment, translating its expertise crafting fake trees and rocks at theme parks like Disneyland into a much more utilitarian line of business.   

From the Tree of Life to mono pines

Valmont Larson began as the Larson Company in the mid-1970s, primarily building habitats for zoos. In the 1980s, the company sought to capitalize on the success of the theme park industry, and it quickly became well known for artificial rockwork and aquatic exhibits at places like SeaWorld. Fake trees were a specialty — the company created Disney’s Tree of Life in Orlando — and in 1992, the company saw new potential in concealing a cell tower in Colorado, resulting in the company’s signature “monopine.”

A cell tower is disguised as a tree at Vintage Club in Indian Wells, Calif.

The tall steel pole is coated with textured faux bark and fake branches with “needles” made of radio-frequency-transparent materials that hide antennas without blocking wireless signals. That particular “tree” and pioneering design is still in use today (in 2019, Valmont acquired Larson and........

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