Services & Engagements
We design four-season gardens for cold-climate properties across the northern United States and adjacent Canada. Every commission begins the same way — a designer on your land, in your soil, with a notebook and a tape measure — never a phone estimate.
Engagement Index
We turn down roughly two of every five inquiries because the engagement type does not fit how we work. The five below are the ones we take. Read them in order; if your project sits inside one of them, the next step is the same in every case.
For homeowners ready to rework the entire property around how it actually lives — kitchen garden, entry sequence, outdoor rooms, hardscape, lighting, plantings.
Multi-acre properties with a main residence, guest structures, driveways, water features, managed woodland, and a long horizon. Designed to be implemented in phases across many seasons.
For custom home builders and architects who need a coordinated landscape package that drops cleanly into their construction documents and survives review in cold-climate jurisdictions.
Returning degraded land to working native plant communities — prairie, oak savanna, lakeshore buffer, shoreline stabilization — using species that belong here and have a track record in our trial garden.
For landscape contractors who want a registered landscape architect on the team for the design package, while they retain the client relationship and the build.
We accept a maximum of 14 new commissions per year. As of January, 11 of 14 slots for the 2025 design season are already reserved. The earliest booking window for a new Site Visit is six to eight weeks out.
How We Work
On-site. Slow on purpose.
Every commission begins with a paid on-site Site Visit. We travel to the property in person, walk the land in the season it currently is, take soil and exposure notes by hand, and review what is there before we draw a single line. We do not price from satellite imagery, and we do not start work from a phone call. A designer in the field is the entire reason the work holds up in February.
After the Site Visit, every client receives a free 30-minute video walkthrough of their property in current conditions. For most projects that means walking the site in snow cover, when wind patterns, drainage lines, and microclimates are visible in ways summer hides. You review the footage, ask questions, and decide whether to move into a full design contract. No pressure to sign that day.
From signed contract to issued drawings, typical timelines run twelve to twenty weeks depending on scope. Restoration and estate work runs longer. We will not compress a design to fit a builder's schedule — if a phase needs another season of observation, we say so and explain why.
We design, we do not install. Hardscape construction is executed by our in-house stone crew or by vetted regional contractors we have worked with for over a decade. Irrigation systems are designed in-house and installed by partner contractors. We do not work outside the northern U.S. and adjacent Canada, and we do not promise gardens suited to climates warmer than USDA zone 5.
Before You Book
We work throughout the northern United States and adjacent Canada. Our active project area covers Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, upstate New York, New England, and high-altitude Western states. Site Visits within our core service area are scheduled in two-to-three-day trips. Properties outside that zone are reviewed on a case-by-case basis and may carry an additional travel fee — we will quote that on the call before any commitment is made.
The Site Visit is a paid, half-day engagement with a senior designer on your property. The fee covers the designer's time, travel within our core service area, written site analysis, soil and exposure notes, and the 30-minute video walkthrough delivered afterward. It is credited toward the design contract if you choose to proceed within ninety days. We will not give a number without understanding the property — every Site Visit is quoted after a short call.
A bound design package: master plan, planting plans annotated against our Five-Season Plant Matrix for spring bulb, summer bloom, fall color, winter structure, and wildlife forage value, hardscape drawings with cold-climate construction details, lighting plan, drainage and snow management notes, and a phased implementation schedule with cost ranges. Builder Spec Package clients receive permit-ready CAD drawings instead.
Full-Yard Redesigns typically run twelve to sixteen weeks from signed contract to issued drawings. Estate Master Plans run twenty to thirty weeks because of the two-visit observation requirement. Restoration work is scheduled across a full calendar year so we see the land in every season. We will give you a written timeline before you sign — and we hold to it unless scope changes, in which case we discuss the change before making it.
We design. Hardscape construction is carried out by our in-house stone crew — two specialists trained in dry-stack limestone and Lake Superior basalt retaining walls — or by regional contractors we have worked with for over a decade. Planting installation is typically handled by the homeowner with our crew supervising the first day, or by one of three contractor partners we recommend by region. We do not install irrigation systems; we design them and coordinate with irrigation contractors.
The Next Step
Consultations are paid, on-site, and currently booking six to eight weeks out. Eleven of fourteen 2025 commission slots are already reserved. Tell us about the land and we will be in touch within two business days with availability.
Or call the studio directly at +1 (218) 555-0142 · [email protected]
