My love of the garden and landscaping no doubt was nurtured early on as my early childhood was spent in the garden of my family home in the Santa Cruz Mountains, following the instructions of my elite gardener, mother.  She did her best to keep my attentions on what were the good plants that got to stay… and what were the bad ones, which of course needed to be removed.  My many mishaps at this endeavor were great for learning, although an overall detriment to her overall goals, as many of the ‘good’ plants met a very early demise indeed!  It all paid off for her though when I got big enough to dig planting holes and haul countless wheel barrows of manure and compost for her.

Moving into Los Gatos High School and needing money to have any hope of getting a date, I translated these early skills into a job for Birdsong Landscaping, and quickly got to the point of running a small crew for the owner.  It was here that I scratched out my earliest designs on school note paper, and selected plants from the local nurseries to finish up my mini masterpieces… at least in my mind!

On to college where I studied Botany, Environmental Horticulture, Landscape Architecture, and Viticulture … because I do have to say grape vines are my favorite plant of all!  Especially when the end result is a fine Cabernet, Pinot Noir, or Zinfandel!

In my long landscape design career I have been extremely fortunate to have been able to design homes in nearly every county in Northern California and have been delighted to study and become knowledgeable in the local micro climates, soils, and architecture.

My installed designs have been featured in national based companies advertisements and nationally distributed calendars.  I have also had the honor of being featured in multiple episodes of the popular HGTV show YardCrashers (see the Crashing Yards! page to see some of my work).  I have also been hired for creating gardens in nationally televised commercials featuring gardening products.

In my break from doing designs, I worked in San Francisco for the dot.com company PlantSense which manufactured the innovative EasyBloom plant sensor.  There I managed the vast plant database for the sensor, and acted as the face of the company to our customers as the ‘Plant Doctor’ where I answered their questions and blogged about plants and horticulture.  This even furthered my education and experience in horticulture in landscaping…especially in the greater Bay Area where we were based and did most of our research and work.

I can’t wait to use my vast experience in landscaping and horticulture to create the absolute perfect outdoor living space for you and your family.  Look forward to seeing you and your yard soon!

Best!

~ Ian Hall