5 Reasons to Hire an Experienced Landscape Designer
All landscapes change over time, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t plan for the future.
If you’re considering ways to improve your landscape now and in the long run, the best way to start is with a comprehensive landscape design.
It’s fair to wonder ‘should I hire a landscape designer?’ After all, some apps and websites offer homeowners ways to drop their favorite plants into a picture of their own landscape, and many landscapers will provide estimates without an accompanying design.
If you’re planning to turn your outdoor space into an extension of your home, the right way to get started is to picture your ideas with professional landscape design.
1. Great Designs Keep Maintenance in Mind
It’s satisfying to see a new landscape renovation completed. Unlike other home improvement projects, though, the end of a project isn’t the end of the work.
Landscapes are living systems, and some measure of maintenance is required for all types of designs.
Professional landscapers work with gardens at all stages, from installation of new selections to long-term maintenance of mature plants. As landscapers, we know when a tree or shrub is in the wrong place, or when a hedge has been hacked and pruned beyond repair.
Most importantly, we know how to avoid these issues entirely by designing landscapes with long-term maintenance in mind.
Professional landscape design isn’t just about filling a space with the prettiest plants. A landscape expert will help you beautify a space while keeping one eye toward the future maintenance care that will be needed to keep it looking its best.
2. Great Designs are Blueprints for Installation
What could be an award-winning landscape design on paper is no good if not installed properly. Like many industries, your landscape provider works in teams.
From sales to design to installation to maintenance, a project can touch many hands in the same organization.
That’s why hiring a landscape designer isn’t just a matter of planning, but of execution.
Proper designs select the right plants for each place in the garden, but they also scale properly to account for future growth. It can be tempting to fill a space with selections at their nursery size, but a landscape expert will account for the life of each plant and how its growth will affect the entire garden over time.
Production teams benefit from a professional landscape design as much as a homeowner. By seeing everything in its right place before shovel breaks ground, installers can give your landscape the best chance to succeed.
3. Great Designs Capture Your Garden as It Will Be
Walk the showroom of a home improvement store and everything you see is as it will look in your home.
Walk around a garden center for an afternoon, and what you see is only a preview of what’s to come.
Overplanting a space can be as damaging as any other misstep in the garden. To understand how plants change over time - and to avoid the trap of overplanting to achieve an insta-landscape - a professional landscape design is necessary.
Landscape experts can picture a garden as it will be, not as it is on the last day of installation. Your Sarasota gardens may look less than you imagined after the installation project is complete, but this is common.
A professional landscape design should be rendered with plants at their full maintained size. In other words, the plan is written with the mature size of your plants in mind - not their current size in the nursery.
Though you may have to wait to see your gardens reach their full potential, working with a professional landscape designer gives you a glimpse into the future - and avoids common pitfalls in the present.
4. Great Designs Fit Every Project - and Client
Landscape design can be as thorough as architecture and as simple as bubbles on the back of a napkin.
Your goals in the landscape should be reflected in the level of landscape design you choose.
For homeowners in search of the low-maintenance garden, simple planview designs - or ‘overhead’ renderings of your home and landscape - should suffice.
The most thorough designs, rendered in three dimensions and picturing your plants at their full maintained size, can put you at eye-level with the future of your outdoor spaces.
Professional landscape designers are best able to render your home and gardens in the future you have in mind.
5. Great Designs View the Landscape as Part of the Home
Just like you wouldn’t furnish one room of your home without considering the rest, you should view your landscapes with the same focus on style, function and continuity.
Your backyard, front yard and the spaces that connect them should all be aimed at the same overall goal. Professional landscape design ensures that they do.
You may be looking for a long-term, low-maintenance solution. Maybe your goal is to create a private, verdant garden where you can retreat at the end of a long day. By hiring a landscape designer, you’ll be able to answer the most important question - how will you use your landscape?
Whatever the goal of your outdoor spaces, putting pen to paper allows you to see that each part of the landscape works toward your goals.
Find the Right Sarasota Landscape Expert for You
An investment in your landscape is an investment in your home. And just as you wouldn’t hire a builder to create a new addition without first seeing their plans, nor should you commit to a large landscape renovation without a professional landscape design.
By working with a landscape expert, you’re getting much more than the blueprint of your new projects. Great landscape design comes from those with the experience to understand how design lays the groundwork for installation and the long-term maintenance of your gardens.
Done right, a professional landscape design is a peek into the future of your outdoor spaces.
Our professional design teams understand the Sarasota landscape, and can help you craft an outdoor plan that looks great, maintains correctly and constantly improves the look and value of your home.
Reach out to us today to see the difference when you hire a professional landscape designer.
