You can actually just bury the sprinkler control valves in the dirt, but that makes repair difficult, so its common practice to stick them in a box like this. I hooked up my four valves with some solid PVC pipe, and ran all the piping from the sprinkler heads into the box. I used an old piece of downspout to cover the incoming pipes, so that i don’t accidentally cut them while digging in the garden. The controller for the valves will be mounted in the garage, not to far away.