Kyle H. Crooke, ASLA

I always thought that greywater has too many pathogens to be safely used for irrigation anywhere people would come in contact with it. Not true?

I just started working at a new firm, Rana Creek. The first LEED project I am working on is a large scale neighborhood renovation project that will capture greywater from showers & laundry for a for landscape irrigation. It turns out from our initial calculations, all the homes intended for water harvesting collected too much water, so we needed…[Read more]

Just a thought from Soil Science perspective on reducing the water requirements for any plant. Use lots of organic material and or peat moss around the plant,(not too much) and surround other areas with sand. Make sure the drip is going on the water holding material. Sand has the lowest affinity for water while clay has the highest and organic…[Read more]

James Richards is great. I love his simple color palette. He blends darker colors in his lighter colors to make things look cohesive. For instance, he used carmine red and true blue (i think it was true blue) prismacolor color pencils over cream to create this really nice effect. So, the cream hardscape and buildings really popped after i tried to…[Read more]

I am currently working on a classroom addition for a high school which is a LEED project. We are designing a central courtyard that demonstrates a variety of LID features. These include porous concrete paving, four rain gardens and a cistern that collects rain water from the roof. Most of the materials being used have some recycled content. We are…[Read more]

hi everybody, i just graduated with my MLA and was worried I couldn’t take a LEED exam without LEED experience, I scanned and attached my diploma to the registration and I’m qualified to take the LEED GA – I haven’t received the study materials yet because they’re on backorder but thought I’d let the word out

Is anyone working on a LEED project now? How is it going? Share with us…

Two years after clearing the invasives in my part of the creekbed in my backyard – you know, plants like Arundo and Tamarisk (how did that get there?) and Washingtonia palms (we all know how that got there) – the birds were kind enough to plant 3 Quercus agrifolia and a Toyon that is now about 12′ high. None of these are requiring additional water…[Read more]

Christmas berry!? They can make a landscape designer a hero!

greetings. hope everyone is staying inspired.

-doreen
cpp, 2009

I just received mine a few days ago too and I passed on the 27th of June.

Hello, Hope to exchange knowledge and experience. Regards to All. ümit harite from turkey

Hi all I’ve just uploaded some of my latest university drawings please send any positive criticism. Thanks.

Come out to Midtown today!!

Everyone come out to the Design Competition awards ceremony today at Hot Italian (16th and Q St – Sacramento) for free pizza and drink and to congratulate this year’s Sierra Chapter Design Competition winners. THe event starts at noon with an open house display of all the entries. the Award ceremony itself will be…[Read more]

Chris-
I know exactly what mean. It would be almost impossible to be a true advocate for the client if you were being paid a sales commission from the contractor. The commission I was referring to is more like maybe a “finders fee”, if you will. I run across all sorts of projects and not all of them are appropriate for a designer. So I refer the…[Read more]

So much to learn from you lot, hopefully contribute some stuff that may be of interest. All abstract and still learning the basics of Vector/sketch up etc. Being a Mac user can you survive with out AutoCad? ( can’t do the Windows Geekdom thing)

Chirs,
Here in Texas we are not required to be licensed for landscape contracting. Sometimes I wish we were because every guy that has lost his job in the last few months has become a landscaper/maintenace contractor. I am sometimes bidding against people that are brand new in the business.
I am working with several Landscape Architects like…[Read more]

Hey Chris,
We are in Phoenix, and we do mainly design and subcontract the work out on high end residential designs. I believe we are the main contractor, and the work is divided accordingly.

Chris,
I operated a design/build company for 25 years where most of the work we did in-house with some sub-contracting on the specialized features. I now work by myself designing and then managing the projects. I have a network of contractors that work on these projects. I have a design fee and then negotiate a management fee with the…[Read more]

Elif-

I have learned that high-level or not, clients don’t read a lot of text. They’re swayed by images, sketches, pretty colors, and your passion. If you say Mondrian, show them what/who that is so they don’t have to ask. Have images that clearly delineate the connection between a Mondrian piece and your design (for example). If you communicate…[Read more]