22. Why Design?
What can a landscape architect do that a gardener can’t? Why do I need design drawings for my yard project at all? These are common questions, and in fact there are a wide range of companies out there who can provide many different levels of landscape design and installation. The spectrum of services goes from just showing up at your house with a bunch of plants and soil, to planning out the garden with an artistic combination of plants that looks good year round, enduring for many years.
I’m a strong advocate for doing some level of planning of your garden on paper no matter how small it appears. If you want a truly gorgeous and durable garden – on the first try – investing a little in design will go a long way.
What is a Landscape Architect?
A landscape architect is trained to look at the big picture, consider how the garden will look in all seasons over many years, and how all the parts work together. They are able to offer a wide variety of design solutions based on experience with many different styles, building materials, and plant types. They are keeping up on the latest research on soil health, water conservation, recycled materials and other aspects of sustainability. In other words, a landscape architect’s expertise provides foresight, beauty, and durability.
Anyone officially using the title Landscape Architect in California is required by law to be licensed, which means meeting certain education requirements, passing an exam, and abiding by a set of professional standards. Landscape architects typically focus on the design work, not the actual installation or maintenance. This allows us to work hard on making a beautiful composition for your yard that fits your needs and budget. Landscape architects are trained in a step by step process for designing outdoor spaces that is comprehensive and thorough. You can read about my design approach and process here.
What I think of as gardeners are people who specialize in taking care of gardens that are already there and maybe making small changes to plantings. If you only need small adjustments, a gardener can probably do well, but if you are looking for a bigger change and want to consider the full range of options for all things exterior, then you are better off consulting a Landscape Architect, and there are four aspects worth elaborating on:
1. Visualizing the Garden
For any major landscaping project, it is important to be able to understand what it will look like before building it – you can’t move trees, dirt and concrete around like the furniture inside a house. By working with a landscape architect you get to consider various options before spending any money on construction. It is of course much easier to draw a variety of pathway layouts, deck shapes, etc. than to build and re-build them, so it is vital that you spend some time thinking through what you want and how it will fit on the site before you break ground. Because landscape architects have broad experience, we are able to show you the full range of options for style, materials, and layout. We also have the training and experience to point out opportunities for more environmentally friendly features such as rainwater harvesting or greywater systems.
2. Accurate Budgeting/Pricing
By having a landscape architect prepare a set of drawings that completely describe the landscape design and its construction, you can get a very accurate idea of what it will cost to build. Especially if you want to compare prices from multiple contractors, it is important to have as much detail as possible put down in drawings so that they are all pricing the same thing – “apples to apples” as they say. The more room left open for interpretation, the more chance there is that a contractor will leave out something and come back to you later with additional costs.
3. Permitting
For a landscape that is part of a new house, or a major house remodel, the drawings that Landscape Architects are experts in preparing are usually required to get the building permits from the City. If the landscape is over a certain square footage, state law AB1881 requires conformance to irrigation water use requirements which are verified by submitting planting and irrigation drawings, along with water use calculations. (The exact square footage is set by each city or county). Any substantial structures like stairs and retaining walls can require a permit on their own, and of course fence construction often requires a permit and approval of neighbors.
4. Construction Administration
A Landscape Architect can also provide expert assistance in keeping the project construction on schedule and on budget. We often function as the owner’s representative and make frequent site visits to see that things are being installed as specified, and can be on call for any quick decisions that need to be made when issues arise. Landscape features such as drainage, irrigation, and soil amendment are not easily inspected after the fact and it may take years to discover a mistake. This can also extend to doing the field layout of important pathways, making sure that everything lines up like it should, and getting that important view out your window just right.
The Design-Build Approach
There is often a desire to spend less on design and drawings, and go quickly to the construction. This is usually called a “design-build” project, meaning that a Landscape Contractor works from a loose set of drawings that show the intent of the design, but don’t specify every single detail of the construction. There are some definite risks involved with this, but if it is done right, it can save time and money overall. Besides having an experienced designer prepare the design-build drawings, the key to this approach is to have a Contractor that you can trust. You will typically be relying on them to get started without knowing every detail of what is to be built, and possibly not agreeing to an exact price. This is not advisable with an unknown contractor because once they are on your property and have things underway, it is much harder to switch to a different company if things aren’t going well.
Every Garden is Unique
I think if you look carefully you can spot a garden that has been well designed, and one that has not. I hoped to find photos to illustrate the difference clearly, but this is tough because every garden is as unique as the piece of land it occupies. This gets to one of the big reasons I love landscape architecture - it can’t really be commodified into a mass production, cookie cutter approach. I continue to be excited by the new challenge of each new landscape design project, a new micro-environment to understand and enliven!
References:
This writing is based on my response to interview questions by real estate agent Josh Dickinson, published in his newsletter The Code http://eastbayhouselove.wordpress.com/the-code/ the article is archived at: http://us6.campaign-archive2.com/?u=3f616537ecc893c258ec42b5c&id=0b8802a309“
Landscape Architects are licensed by the State of California. Any questions concerning a Landscape Architect may be referred to the Landscape Architects Technical Committee at: 2420 Del Paso Road, Suite 105, Sacramento, CA 95834, 916-575-7230. Web site: http://www.latc.ca.gov/
The American Society of Landscape Architects website www.asla.org has more information on landscape architecture including this interactive page: http://www.asla.org/design/index.html