Marin County Landscaping
Yards designed and built for the way Marin actually works: steep lots, clay soil, wet winters and dry summers.
Call [TRACKING NUMBER]Free estimate, no obligation.
or get a free quote- Free written estimates
- Design through installation
- All of Marin County
A Marin Yard Has to Survive Two Seasons
Picture your yard in late January. Three days of rain, the ground already full, and water finding every low spot it can: pooling on the patio, running along the foundation, creeping down the slope behind the house. Now picture the same yard in August. The clay has baked into something close to brick, it's cracked in a pattern like a dry lakebed, and anything that was planted in the wrong place is giving up.
That swing is the whole story of landscaping here. The county's soil holds water in winter and refuses it in summer, and a lot of the lots sit on hillsides that make both problems worse. A yard built for one season fails in the other. So we design for both: grade the ground so water leaves on its own, build patios and walls on bases that stay put when the soil moves, and pick plants that drink in winter and shrug off a dry July. Get those three right and the yard looks good in both months, year after year.
What We Build
01Landscape Design
We draw the whole yard before anyone digs. Layout, materials, planting and drainage worked out on paper, where changes are cheap.
Landscape Design →
02Landscape Installation
Complete yard builds, from the first day of clearing to the final planting. One crew, one plan, every step in order.
Landscape Installation →
03Patios, Pathways and Hardscaping
Pavers, flagstone and concrete over a base that's dug deep and packed hard, so the patio is still flat in twenty years.
Patios and Hardscaping →
04Retaining Walls
Block, stone and concrete walls with drain rock and pipe behind them, sized for a Marin hillside in a wet winter.
Retaining Walls →
05Yard Drainage
French drains, catch basins and regrading that get water away from the house and off the slope before it does damage.
Yard Drainage →
06Irrigation and Drip Systems
Drip lines and smart controllers tuned to each bed, so plants get what they need and your water bill gets a break.
Irrigation and Drip →
07Drought-Tolerant Landscaping
Natives and Mediterranean plants that handle Marin's dry summers on a fraction of the water a lawn needs.
Drought-Tolerant Landscaping →What Sets Our Work Apart
Ground first, plants last.
Grading, drainage and bases get built before anything decorative, because that's the order that lasts.
One crew, start to finish.
Design, hardscape, irrigation and planting all come from the same people, so nothing falls between the cracks.
A written estimate before we start.
Every line spelled out, so there are no surprises at the end.
How It Works
- Tell us about the yard. A quick call, or the form with a few lines on what you have and what you want.
- We come look. A site visit to measure, check the slope and soil, and talk through ideas and budget on the spot.
- Plan and price. You get a design direction and a written estimate, and nothing moves until you approve it.
- We build it. Ground work first, planting last, then a walkthrough with you when it's done.
Free estimate, no obligation.
Yards We Build Across Marin
Every part of Marin asks for something different. On the hillsides above Mill Valley and Sausalito, the work is walls and drainage, holding the slope and moving winter water off it. Up in Novato, with its hot summers and deep clay, it's soil prep, plant choice and irrigation that make or break a yard. The canyon lots in Fairfax and San Anselmo stay shaded and damp into May. Waterfront gardens in Tiburon and Belvedere take wind and salt air all year. And on the larger properties in Ross and Kentfield, the job is usually about pulling a big, scattered yard together into one place you actually use. We plan each one around what it's up against.
Common Questions
More than mow. A landscaper shapes the ground, fixes drainage, builds patios, paths and walls, puts in irrigation, and plants the beds. Some companies only handle maintenance. We do the building side: the one-time projects that change how a yard looks and works. That might be a single patio or a full backyard rebuild. If the job involves digging, pouring, stacking or planting, it's ours.
It starts with a site visit, where we measure the yard, check the slope and soil, and hear what you want from it. Then we draw up a plan and a written estimate. Once you sign off, the build runs in a fixed order: grading and drainage first, then walls and patios, then irrigation, then plants and mulch. That order means we never tear up finished work to reach something underneath. A patio takes days. A whole yard takes weeks.
Conditions first, looks second. We check how much sun each bed gets, how fast the soil drains, and how much water you're willing to use. Deer roam most of the county, so we lean toward plants they skip. Natives and Mediterranean plants usually thrive here because they evolved for the same wet-winter, dry-summer pattern. Near the house, we also avoid anything that burns easily.
Fall is prime planting season here. The soil is still warm from summer, the first rains settle new roots in, and plants get a whole winter to establish before the heat returns. Hardscape goes in almost year round, with a pause only for heavy rain. Spring is when everyone calls, so starting your landscape design in fall or winter usually means an earlier build date and a yard that's ready by summer.
Yes, and in much of Marin it's worth planning for. The ground right against the house, roughly the first five feet, matters most, because that's where blowing embers land and catch. Gravel, stone and bare soil do well there. Bark mulch and dense shrubs don't. Farther out, it's about spacing plants, pruning low branches and clearing dry growth. We build all of it into our drought-tolerant landscaping without turning the yard into a parking lot.