Has someone provided you with a lovely design for a new garden for you?
Are you excited by it and are now looking for a landscaper to bring your dream garden to life?
Would you like to get a quote on your new garden so you can have some idea how much it might cost to build it?
If this is the first time you've engaged a landscape designer you might not know one key thing that surprises many people - not all garden designs are equal or even the same. And the design you have for your beautiful new garden, might not be something a landscaper can actually quote from!
With over 30 years experience creating hundreds of gardens across Melbourne and the Mornington Peninsula, we've come across this situation before many times. This article should help you find out exactly what kind of garden "design" you have and what to do next to have any chance of bringing your dream garden brought to life.
Finding out what sort of garden 'design' you actually have
It's rare to find a garden design so accurately detailed that a landscaper can simply take the design, sit down and start generating a fairly accurate quote for you. We just don't see this.
Many are simply a very lovely vision of what your new garden could look like. Apart from being something beautiful to look at and dream about, they are of no real value to anyone else because nobody can DO anything with them. No landscaper on earth can quote from them as they simply do not have any detail in them.
Occasionally we come across a garden design that sits somewhere in between these two extremes.
We do understand it can be very confusing and disappointing to discover that the garden design you thought you have is not what is needed to create your garden. But we don't want to give you a false impression. This is simply a truth in the landscape design industry.
Let us explain further.
Is it a concept design, master plan or both?
Unfortunately to add to the confusion about what type of garden design you might actually have, there is unfortunately no standard in the industry for what a garden design actually is.
Essentially a garden design is USUALLY, but not always, just a concept for what a garden could look like. It has all the key elements in it, describing where they go - so the pool goes here, the deck goes here, the garden with all the plants goes here, etc.
But what it usually lacks is any detail on what the deck is made of, what type of pool it is (fibreglass or concrete), which plants are to be planted etc.
Generally all of this detail goes into what is called a Master Plan. This is like an expanded, highly detailed version of the design which provides important details necessary for someone to quote to build the garden.
Where it gets tricky is that some landscape designers include a Master Plan in their garden design and some don't. So you often don't know what you've got until you go to a landscaper to get your new garden quoted.
How do I know what sort of garden design I have?
The best way to help you understand the differences between garden designs (and Master Plans) and how they affect a landscaper trying to quote to build a garden is by showing you some examples.
Here is an example of a 'garden design' that a potential client provided to us recently. He said he would like a quotation to landscape it. When we saw it, we knew straight away it was grossly inadequate for quoting purposes.
When we asked if his designer had provided any more details, he said, "No, just this design."
There were no details on the 'design' at all. What type of plants, what kind of pavers, what type of material for the deck, etc. Nothing!
So we were unable to quote this without going into long and detailed discussions about what the client expected everything to be as the designer had simply not provided anywhere near enough detail on the design. And there was no Master Plan to accompany it.
It's a bit misleading to call this a garden 'design'. It's essentially just a computer created "sketch" of what a garden might look like in broad detail. But no landscaper could ever create an accurate quote from it.
Here is another example of a 'design' created by a landscape designer that appears to have more detail but is still not something a landscaper can quote from.
This design mentions 'Concrete steppers' or Bluestone Pitchers', but doesn't specify which one. Nor their size. (There is a vast difference in price between the two and the size would make a huge difference in price too.)
The images attached to the 'design' also show 2 completely different types of gates. Again they would be very different in price from each other and require a different type of fence to go with them. Again, which one does the designer want quoted?
As you can see from these examples, if your so-called garden 'design' is short on detail, no one can quote from it or build from it. It's actually a design that raises more questions than it answers.
What type of design do I need to have?
Sometimes the problem actually isn't to do with the lack of detail in your garden design itself.
Detail is actually the job of the Master Plan. A designer SHOULD create a Master Plan after they have created their garden design to provide all the details that are not usually provided on the design itself.
Details like the size, type and style of pavers. What material the deck will be made of. Whether the pool is fibreglass or concrete. Which type of plants should planted in every part of the garden. etc, etc
So what you really need is a garden design WITH a detailed Master Plan to accompany it. (The trick, as stated before, is that some designers include a Master Plan with their design but don't call it that and others would have no idea how to create a Master Plan.) You may therefore not know what you have by labels alone.
If you'd like to know more about what a Master Plan is and why it's so important to you getting your new garden created, please take a look at this article: What's included in a landscape designer's Master Plan?
Is there a difference in garden designs between different designers?
Many landscape designers work independently and simply design gardens. They do not have a landscaping department in their business so after they design your garden, you will often have to source a landscaper yourself to create your garden. (A landscaper builds but does NOT design gardens.)
Now if you are smart enough to have had your garden designed by COS Design, Nathan Burkett, Lisa Ellis, Jack Merlo, and others (including Whyte Gardens), you can relax. You have invested wisely and you will receive a professional, detailed design along with a Master Plan that can be used by a landscaper to provide a quotation.
With a garden design from these companies there is enough detail in the Master Plan for the landscaper to take accurate measurements used to calculate costs.
A good landscape designer will also provide a planting plan with all the details of which type of plants are required for the garden, of which size and in what quantity, as shown below. This can be sent on to a nursery with a submission asking for a costing, so that can be accurately quoted.
Here is another extract from a proper Garden Design/Master Plan that shows the detail required for a landscaper to accurately quote from. If you look closely you can see the detailed specification of the gate for example, and how much it differs from a simple couple of example photos as shown above.
With this much detail - the exact size of the gate, what material it is made from, how it is finished and even what the frame is made from - a landscaper can now accurately quote it, not be forced to guess.
What happens when important details on a garden design are missing?
We cannot stress enough how the devil is in the detail when it comes to designing and constructing a garden. In many ways it is the detail rather than the big overall concept of the garden that will ensure you end up happy with your garden. Without that detail, a garden design can be virtually worthless as no one can do anything with it.
The Master Plan provides a 'shopping list' if you like for the garden design to make it possible be created. It's a bit like a recipe for baking a cake. You can have a picture of the final cake (garden design) and it can look delicious and inviting but without a recipe (master plan) for how to make it, you are only guessing at what might be in it.
Without the proper ingredients in the right quantities, you will never be able to make the cake and any attempt could end in disaster.
How detailed does the detail need to be?
Some garden designs might specify a 'Paved Area' but this is of no use. What type of pavers? What size? What thickness? Laid in what pattern?
If the design says 'Bluestone Paved Area', this still has nowhere near enough detail to provide an accurate quote.
Even if the designer specifies '800/400/20mm Bluestone paving' you can get a rough costing but if the actual supplier is not specified there can still be issues.
Here is an example. In the image below you can see Bluestone pavers being laid in a modular pattern. But these were a very specific type of paver from a supplier who provides a particularly darker bluestone than other suppliers, which tend to be greyer.
Now often when a designer is presenting a concept design for a garden to a client they might show them a sample of a particular paver they'd love to see in the garden, but if the designer does not specify the supplier, the landscaper might chose another supplier and the client ends up with different pavers than the ones they expected to have installed.
What's the worst that can happen?
If you provide a landscaper with a garden 'design' that just does not have anywhere near enough detail in it to be properly quoted, you can get into trouble.
Because a Landscape Designer's job is to create a detailed vision and plan for a future garden.
But a Landscaper's job is to build that garden from the plans provided.
If a designer has not provided a proper detailed Master Plan with the design, who is the only person who can guess that detail? The landscaper!
This is where the problem lies. A landscape designer is a creative person who conjures something from nothing. They are part artist and part technician. A landscaper is experienced at building gardens but when they are obliged to start designing things (because the design is inadequate) they take on a different role and that's when things get messy.
When a landscaper is given an inadequate design, you will hear them say "But what size is this? What material is this meant to be? Who is the supplier?" To which a client will usually reply, "I don't know, what do you think?"
Now the landscaper can voice their opinions and say "well I'd probably.... " But that means they end up doing 20 hours of extra work (for free) trying to be a designer and coming up with suggestions. Trust me, this is NOT how you want your garden project run.
Is all I need a design and a Master Plan?
In most cases if you have a proper garden design, along with a fully detailed Master Plan, you should be able to get a landscaper to provide an accurate quote to create your dream garden.
But for some more complex garden projects there can be a couple of additional elements required. First you may need Working Drawings that show 'how' something like the deck or the pergola or the outdoor kitchen will be built, so more accurate costings can be calculated.
Finally an Engineer may have to become involved to specify more detailed aspects of the project so that a truly final, accurate quote can be provided. For example here is an image of a project showing where an engineer had to specify concrete piers to be installed all around a pool, which led to additional costs.
(If you'd like to understand more about Working Drawings and Engineering, please read this article: Do I really need working drawings for my landscaping?)
What can be done if the design provided is inadequate.
Ideally, the best approach is to always ensure you provide a detailed garden design, along with a Master Plan to your landscaper in order for them to properly quote the project.
If you don't, one of the 3 following things tends to happen (all of which are definitely going to lead to problems).
- The landscaper has to circumvent the design and do many extra hours of work for free, effectively taking over the designer's role and doing all the work that should have been done. But not being a designer they won't do as good a job as the designer would have.
- You, the client will have pay another landscape designer to create a revised garden design that includes all the details in a Master Plan
- You have to go back to the original landscape designer and ask them to detail everything for which they will charge additional fees.
At Whyte Gardens we avoid doing No. 1 and we would advise you not to attempt to do this with another landscaper. Because to build your garden, you may need working drawings with dimensions and details showing how something is to be built, and to have these created, you first need a proper Master Plan, which a landscaper can't do.
We sometimes have to do No. 2 but not often. Once people feel they have already paid for a garden design (even if it is clearly inadequate) they grudge having to pay more to get a proper one done. Also once you invite another designer to work with you, there tends to be changes made as the new designer will introduce new ideas to the garden.
In all my 30 years in the landscaping industry I have never seen a designer agree to do No. 3 as clearly the designer won't want to do it otherwise they would have done it right the first time.
Remember a landscaper wants to provide as accurate a quote to you as they possibly can and do not want to mislead you on how much your beautiful new garden will cost. But they cannot give you the accurate quote you need without the vital details provided by the designer, whether on the design itself or the master plan.
At Whyte Gardens we certainly don't want to mislead you with quotes. We've written this article to help you understand why, if you come to us what you think is an adequate garden design for quoting and we tell you it's not suitable, hopefully now you can understand why.
We hope you have found this article of interest and value to you. If you still have unanswered questions about garden design, landscaping or quoting in general, please feel free to contact us by phone or email. We will be more than happy to answer your questions. Contact us here.
You might also find one of these additional articles helpful:
Additional reading on design & landscaping in Melbourne & Mornington Peninsula...
What are the steps to go from garden design to starting landscaping?
The most common mistakes to avoid when engaging a designer or landscaper
8 Vital Decisions Required in Creating Your Ideal Garden
