California Landscape Design

Residential Design $25-$100K Gold Award

“Modern Tudor Courtyard Garden” in Santa Barbara, CA

Residential Design over $100K Silver Award

“Terrace Pool Garden” in Santa Barbara, CA
also by Isa Hendry Eaton

Residential Design over $100K Gold Award

“Canyon View Terrace, Los Angeles, CA”

Residential Design $25-$100K Silver Award

“Rain Garden Reimagined” in Los Angeles, CA

Residential Design $25-$100K Gold Award

“Hillside Haven” in Berkeley, CA

Residential Design $25-$100K Silver Award

“Clark Residence” in Los Altos, CA

Residential Design $25-$100K Gold Award

“Tranquil Water-Side Sanctuary” in Novato, CA

Residential Design $25-$100K Gold Award

“Black Mountain Lodge” in Hillsborough, CA

Planting Design Silver Award

“New Plant Order” in Concord, CA

Small Gardens Bronze Award

“Courtyard Safari” in San Ramon, CA
also by Linda Middleton

Designer of the Year Award

“Via Hermosa” in Orinda, CA

Residential Design over $100K Gold Award

“Berryhill” in Orinda, CA
also by Colin Miller

Residential Design over $100K Silver Award

“Alhambra Valley” in Martinez, CA
also by Colin Miller

Small Gardens Gold Award

“Dar Ben-Lisa” in Los Angeles, CA

Residential Design over $100K Silver Award

“Beverly Hills Manor” in Beverly Hills, CA
also by Laura Morton

Residential Design $25-$100K Silver Award

“Berkeley Terrace” in Berkeley, CA

Mid-Century Modern Home in Sausalito

In addition to some exterior updates, the landscape areas were tired and drab and needed a complete remodel. One of the challenges was to offer a solution to minimize the impact of the tall, blank front wall adjacent to the home’s front entrance. My solution was to install a vertical/living wall filled with grasses, perennials and succulents. We used the Florafelt living wall system. It measures 8’x9’. Old aggregate slabs dominated a large portion of the front landscape, driveway and path and a small lawn. My solutions were to redesign the entrance with updated modern concrete pathway slabs leading from a new concrete driveway, replace the lawn with a variety of Mediterranean, low care plants that compliment and echo those in the living wall, and design a new planting area running the length of the street curb to soften the hardscape areas and provide welcoming curb appeal. The project was completed November, 2019.

Photos courtesy of Dig Your Garden Landscape Design.

Music Box in Oakland

An exquisite gem of a space to gather and create music. The beautiful music studio is surrounded by natural materials, low walls and smooth boulders to sit on. A water feature enhances the vibe of marsh and birds depicted in the artfully done mural on the studio wall, surrounded with bunch grasses and low plantings, hoping to invite bird bathing. The curvilinear walls enhance the sense of movement and natural habitat. Lighting in the wide stairs allows the musicians to move equipment with ease between levels. Our design vision is to define the space with a loose hand, allowing the music to be the main event nestled in a gracefully flowing landscape. (Installed by Others).

Tiny Valley Village Garden in North Hollywood

This tiny, tucked away garden is located in Valley Village, a well-established North Hollywood neighborhood that dates back to the 1930’s. The neighborhood is known for its lushly landscaped streets lined with single-family homes. Marilyn Monroe used to live here in the days when she still went by “Norma Jean”. In 2017, I designed and oversaw a complete renovation of the side yard for these long-standing clients.

The dark, narrow area fronted a side street and was previously used as a dog run and utility area. The simple fact that it got afternoon shade made the owners want to do “more” with it.

Our work resulted in an airy, tranquil space with a Zen vibe, perfect for relaxation, family meals, and growing fruits and vegetables in the raised bed “kitchen garden”.

To begin with, we removed an existing hedge of overgrown Hollywood juniper that darkened and overpowered the space. This not only let in light, but it allowed us to reclaim an additional 222 square feet, effectively doubling the size of the space. We then installed a new wood fence and gate for privacy. A large mature olive tree was carefully preserved; it now anchors the yard and adds character.

We installed a generous DG seating area and walkway, and built raised boxes for vegetables and herbs. Planting was restricted to a 3.5-ft wide border and several large fiberglass containers. We added a dry stream bed feature with a flagstone bridge. During weather events, a rain chain captures water from the roof and redirects it to the dry stream bed. One of the owners is an artist, and his large metal sculptures were thoughtfully placed to provide visual interest. Low voltage path lighting was installed, as well as uplights that show off the graceful branch structure of the olive tree. A striking slab fountain from Garden Temple adds the finishing touch required to make the garden into a Zen retreat.

Sustainable/ Watershed Features: Dry stream bed, rain chain, cap sprinkler heads, install efficient drip irrigation system, climate appropriate plants, mulch, LED landscape lighting, permeable decomposed granite hardscape.

Photos courtesy of From the Ground Up Landscape Design.

Beachside in Manhattan Beach

The owners came to us because they had virtually no usable outdoor space in this beachside neighborhood in Manhattan beach. There was one very small deck in the back that only had views of the alley and neighbor’s fence. The front yard is very small and was overgrown and unusable. There are no sidewalks and so the street abuts the yards in this neighborhood. Transforming this space into a place for dining, entertaining and enjoying the beautiful evenings required maximizing every inch. Privacy and a sense of security were the biggest issues. A hedge of tall, lean podocarpus was installed on three sides to screen street traffic and provide privacy. A fence with a planted buffer along the street provides additional screening and keeps pets and kids safe. The stone patio provides just enough room for an intimate outdoor dining area and firepit. The front yard is now an extension of the indoor dining room and gets used almost nightly to relax and unwind.

Project in Napa

Homeowners’ request: The clients contacted us to talk about a small front yard refresh of their wine country getaway.  

When they purchased the property, the landscaping consisted of boxwoods and roses; our clients wanted something to remind them of the clean, contemporary gardens they had seen in Palm Springs.

We structured the planting palette around the Agaves and Aloes they had fallen in love with in the California desert,  adding native and drought tolerant perennials for texture and balance. 

We chose to anchor the project with a multi-trunk Cercis occidentalis and to build the garden around it. 

We divided the space between a dry meadow and a pea-stone drift filled with Aloes and Agaves. The meadow featured Autumn Moor Grass interspersed with the silvery foliage and strikingly bright red/orange flowers of   Helianthemum ‘H enfield Brilliant’, all held in place by large native Matija poppies. In the pea stone drift we planted Agaves, Desert Spoon (Dasylirion wheeleri), and ‘Brakelights’ yucca(Hesperaloe parviflora) punctuated with Elijah Blue fescue and Echeveria ‘Afterglow’ to add color. Landscaping boulders from the local quarry added the needed balance to the design and allow the succulents to shine.

Uh-oh moment: The Clients had recently purchase six dwarf Ginko trees and they had been planted right under the main service drop. We bagged up the trees and moved them to a little side yard creating a small allée with gorgeous fall color.

Every Square Inch in San Francisco

This small project in involved solving multiple problems in a tiny space, including a deck built onto the roof of the new extension that is full of solar tubes and skylights. One solution was we built a small pony wall with curves in it on the side with the solar tubes so we could increase the amount of soil which allowed the use of more types of plants like the aeoniums and heuchera and blue eyed grasses. Then which plants would do well in only 3 or 4 inches of soil where the skylights are like thyme and sedum. They also wanted something to spill over the top of the roof deck so we tried a western morning glory.

The deck had to step down from the house because the client did not want to have any railing so we had to create steps down but take up as little space as possible and include the stairs. the 45 degree in the deck allowed for this.

When I first got to this project there was a 4 foot deep hole the size of the deck in the middle of the yard. I thought they were putting in a small pool. It was a water catchment tank (made for rigid plastic open squares surrounded by heavy liner. This was mostly not in my purview, but we did use the rainwater on the plants for irrigation. The biggest problem was where to hide all the mechanics for this and the irrigation and drainage. Everything in a yard this small that is infrastructure must be thought out so it can be well hidden.

The neighbors behind this property had a building right up against my client’s property line. In order to not loose real estate we got permission to reside and paint the back of the shed to match the owners house to look like it went with the house and then I used a trellis with a vine to create some narrow screening to break up the long expanse of blue.

The owner was glad to have the usable deck but had lost a fair amount of her garden with the push out from the house and the deck. She asked for lush plantings, but we still needed access around the deck. Lots of plants and little stepping stones are the result.

Verdant Venice is an ad hoc committee currently under the aegis of the Venice Neighborhood Council. Although our on-line mission statement sounds rather lofty, basically what we are trying to do is encourage the public and private planting of trees in Venice and ensure that they are cared for. 

Before the virus struck, we were having live meetings and organizing tree walks, trying to educate neighbors on a one-on-one basis about the value of expanding our local canopy. When the virus restrictions went into effect, the City curtailed all live Council meetings and, because our efforts involved mostly in person efforts, we were momentarily stymied. For the most part, zoom meetings don’t work for us and we didn’t want to have virtual meetings that wouldn’t help us reach our goals.

So, we decided that we would focus less on education and more on actually getting trees planted and cared for and, somewhat to our surprise, this has worked out really well. We have managed to plant 60 plus trees in parkways and yards since the Covid virus began, all while wearing masks and maintaining distance with our (steadily growing) group of volunteers. These trees have mostly been planted on Section 8 properties and are all species approved and provided by the City. They include Jacaranda, Bauhinia, Koelreuteria, Handroanthus, Callistemon and (native) Coastal Oak.  

We have also spread mulch on our new yard plantings (also mostly Section 8) where needed, given tree care to past City plantings, succeeded in getting the City to remove 8 dead trees along Venice Blvd., and have future plans to work with both Venice Community Housing and the Department of Recreation and Parks Recreation on several upcoming projects. 

Another on-going and in-the-works project is the removal of concrete collars from 80 plus Sycamores along Venice Blvd. These trees were planted over twenty years ago by a group of motivated locals and have provided the street and sidewalks with much needed shade. They are a California native species and are much admired for their appearance and adaptability, but they are currently being stressed by conditions:  they need to be watered in the dry heat and are being damaged by the permeable concrete collars (agriperm) that were meant to protect them when they were planted. We have had no luck in getting the City to remove the concrete, although they agree that it needs to be done, so we are trying our hand at removing it ourselves, a labor intensive and time-consuming job, that is a hard sell to our volunteers for obvious reasons.

Still, all in all, we feel like “The Little Committee that Could” and are pleased that we can continue to safely encourage the urban canopy, even while the virus has stacked the deck against us.

In the future, we hope to continue working with anyone who wants to see a tree planted in front of their house or in their parkway. And we would like to see the local schools and businesses get more interested in this as well. Wish us luck.

If anyone would like more information, please write to us at noel.only@verizon.net or isabelle@idarchitect.com. 

Qualified Professional Members

A landscape designer who engages in the practice of landscape design for monetary compensation and contains more than 3 years of professional landscape design experience. Documentation of education and experience is required.

Professional Members

A landscape designer who engages in the practice of landscape design for monetary compensation and contains more than 3 years of professional landscape design experience. Documentation of education and experience is required.

Emerging Professional Members

An individual who has been practicing landscape design for one to three years and is starting a career in landscape design. Membership requires affirmation of education and experience, but not documentation.

Cecily Gordon 
Grace Gordon Designs
Coronado, CA 

Andrey Yun 
Return to Eden
Beverly Hills, CA 

Laura Damsgaard Hughes 
Rootsy Garden Design
Half Moon Bay, CA

Student Members

An individual who is actively enrolled, on a full or part‐time basis, in a landscape design, landscape architecture or horticulture program. Membership is limited to five years of membership at this level and proof of enrollment must be submitted.