Thursday, 16 June 2011

Landscape design

While our builder is preparing documents for council submission, hydraulics engineer's report was organised by them, and we received the good news that we will not need a stormwater retention system burried in the back garden. However we will need to move the rainwater tank up to the side of the garage which makes the side access on the right hand side quite a bit narrower.

We decided to use our own landscape designer to do our landscaping for council submission. There was originally $1000 or so allocated for a landscape design in our builder's tender, but it would only get us a basic "lawn and shrubs" type of landscaping drawn up just to get the DA in. So prior to signing the contract, we asked to have the allocated landscaping cost taken out from the tender. By spending just a little more and going to a landscape designer we chose, we were able to have a really nice manicured front garden and low-maintenance but attractive side and back gardens designed. This designer happened to have worked with our builder before, so they will send the finished landscape design to the builder who will then submit it to council along with the house plan.

Our landscape design for front, side and back gardens are brilliant with great plants selection, and very nice features in the front garden to really dress up the house. We are advised of the rough cost for building and planting out the landscaping based on this design, so we will set aside a budget for it.

Side Garden
Front Garden