The Design Process

Designer Duncan Heather argues that more can be made of the preliminary research documents, when it comes to winning design contracts and selling schemes to clients.

When first being taught to allocate space, the landscape student is guided through several different processes before they reach a final design solution.

It all starts with an accurate topographical land survey. A plan of the site is then drawn up to scale, to include boundary walls, existing buildings, trees, services and existing levels.

Having gathered this information on a local scale, the student should then expand their area of study to the surrounding landscape. Topographical, historical cultural and architectural information can be gathered from maps and the internet, which helps put the site into context and may suggest a theme on which to hang their eventual design.

Shadow plans are then calculated to assess the impact of spring and summer shade patterns and a sight Analysis plan developed to note the influencing factors of the site such as existing features, wind direction good and bad views etc.

Once all this information has been compiled, the student can start to experiment with space allocation in the form of bubble or functional diagrams.

All this work is a prerequisite to the creation of the presentation or master plan.

But what happens to all this research once the presentation plans are completed?

What many student fail to appreciate, is the difficulty many clients have in understanding the 2D plan drawings.
While we take it for granted that the ‘house’ is the big black rectangle in the middle of the drawing, it’s surprizing how few clients realise this. You can be waxing lyrical about how great their new garden is going to be, while showing them the plan and they simply can’t make head nor tail of it!

At the Oxford College of Garden Design we teach our students to overcome these difficulties by using the research and preparation drawings as part of the sales presentation.

The diagram above, illustrates the 4 preliminary design stages and can either be presented on separate sheets, or combined into one or 2 presentation drawings. These allow the designer to start their presentation, by going through the site survey and pointing out the house and the important features of the garden. This allows the client time to digest the plan and to familiarise themselves with the graphical nature of the drawings.

Next you can explain how you developed their ideas, by running through the site analysis plan and the bubble/functional diagrams.

Explaining the thought process to your clients helps you justify why you have arrive at a particular design solution, but also it help the client to understand how much work goes into the preparation of a landscape plan.

When you are charging several $1000 for an outline proposal arriving with just one sheet of paper can give the client the impression that they are not getting value for money.

Remember! you only get one crack of the whip at presenting your ideas, so you need to make that ‘sale’ in no more than about 60 minutes, otherwise you won’t get the rest of your design fee and more importantly the garden will never be built.

Arriving with 2-3 sheets of research drawings plus the garden plan, plus any coloured perspective and a mood board, suddenly starts to look like a lot of work and thought has gone into the design.

So if you want to improve your sales and get more of your gardens built, spend a little extra time ‘prettying-up’ your research drawings and use them as part of your presentation.

Duncan Heather is director of the Oxford College of Garden Design and MyGardenSchool and one of Europe top garden designers

Buying Wholesale Plants: Tips & Tricks

One of the hardest things to source as a newly qualified garden/landscape designer is a good supplier of trade plants.  I never buy from Garden Centres as I consider them too expensive (Plants  can have a 200% mark-up on them) 

So here are my top ten tips, I tell my students for sourcing and buying plants from trade nurseries.



1. To buy from trade nurseries you must be a trade customer. While some nurseries offer both retail and wholesale, most trade nurseries do not accept orders from the public, so be prepared to provide proof of your trade status when you first make contact.

2. Always visit a nursery in person before ordering from them for the first time.  Many trade nurseries would want you to make an appointment to visit them rather than you just turning up on spec. Check to see how clean and tidy the nursery is, as this is often a good indication as to how good their plants are.  If the nursery is untidy or has weeds growing in the pots or in the display aisles, this is not a good sign and indicates a certain level of neglect.

3. You often have to order a minimum number of each plant, usually that’s 10 or more of the same variety.

4. In the industry we have 2 levels of plant quality, landscape and garden centre quality. For private gardens you must use garden centre quality plants and I would always stress at the time of order, that I will only accept the very best and will reject anything that is not us to scratch. With some nurseries I would prefer to hand pick my plants in order to guarantee the standard, and suggest until you know and trust your nursery you do the same.

5. Don’t be afraid to reject substandard plants, but this does mean you have to be present when the order is delivered, so they are returned on the same lorry as they arrive. The nurseries will very quickly realise that you can’t be fobbed-off with poor quality stock.

6. Herbaceous perennial plants grow and mature very quickly so order P9 size plants where possible (small square pots) rather than 1-2 litre pot size.  This means you will need to order them in good time and collect your plants in early spring before the nurseries start potting up.  If you don’t, you could end up with a plant costing twice as much and all you get for your money is a larger pot and more soil.

7. Buy plants at the right time of year.  I personally don’t like planting herbaceous plants in autumn as they don’t have long enough to get established before they go dormant for the winter.  This may result in a much higher mortality rate.  Instead I prefer to plant in spring, when I can see the young plants actively growing and they have a whole season to get established.

8. Some plants are only available at certain times of the year.  Grasses have traditionally been most abundant in nurseries from August through to October, and are much harder to get in the spring as most of the stock will have been sold the previous year and new stock takes time to grow.

9. Plants that take longer to mature i.e.shrubs and trees should always be purchased as large as possible.  I prefer to buy semi mature shrubs to give my borders an instant sense of maturity.  The money I save on buying small herbaceous plants can be spent on larger shrubs.  Semi mature trees are cheap!  You can buy an 8m Beach or Oak for between £250-£400  Don’t buy garden centre size trees as it may be decades before your garden looks like the way you intend it to look.

10. Use plants you know you can get hold of!  It’s no good specifying a rare plant that only one nursery in the world grows and then, only propagates 10 a year, because the chances are they won’t be available when you need them.  I use my nursery catalogues to choose the plants that I want and I try to order as early in the season as possible to ensure they have not run out of stock.  If they have, then I always choose the substitutes.  Most nurseries will offer substitutes, but a good designer will always go back to the drawing board and redo the plan with available stock.

    To see a list of trade nurseries I use in the UK click here

    
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At the Oxford College of Garden Design we believe good business is as important as good design, so from day one, we start preparing our student to set up and run their own design business (see DG700).

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