This review is for the first part of our landscape project: namely the design and planning work. I will follow up once the project has been completed with a review of the actual planting.
Although I was trained as a Master Gardener in the Monterey Bay area, I had the pleasure to live in Marana for several years so I am familiar with what grows well in that area. Plus I worked for two years in the nursery at Tohono Chul Park, so I knew at least little bit about the area and what plants I wanted to grow. As a result, I had some ideas in mind when it came designing the landscape for the home we were building.
I started by providing a list of the types of Sonoran Desert plants of which I am fond and some basic ideas to be considered in the design of our landscape. I could not have been happier with how well the design team listed to my input and then put together a top notch design. In a few instances I had an idea that the design team suggested I might not be as happy with as I thought. So I listened to their advice and gave the go ahead for them to incorporate their ideas into proposed layout. The resulting schematic of the landscaping and photos of a few of the plants they were suggesting really helped me make my decisions.
As happy as I was during the pre-design phase, the follow up was even better. Their communication skills and friendliness helped tremendously since we ended up doing most of the planning from 800 miles away. Whether by phone or email, response times to my questions and requests were prompt, clear, and could not have been of better quality That's why I feel the need to provide input before the job is complete. They also interacted well with the Construction Foreman building the house to the actual coordinate landscaping with the completion of the house we are building.
I worked primarily with Amy Dougherty and Megan Colon (East). They are the best!