Creative Scapes

It took 2 calls to get a response from Roger. When he called he quoted his rates and said he would call me later that afternoon and swing by to assess the job and give me an estimate. He never called. I called that evening and left a message and never heard back from him. Unresponsive and unprofessional. If he can't call back or show up to give a bid, I'm glad I didn't hire him.

He is in our area and is also a friend. We used him and he might have used another contractor to come in and do the tree removal. He did all of that and it is a really nice job. It is low maintenance and very creative. We have a modern look with lava rocks between hardscapes and cut tree stumps. We wanted to use our own tree but it was too hard so he brought in various tree trunks. It is just really nice and very different. We have a little bit of zeroscaping, so less water is used. It was an excellent job. The strength of Roger is his creativity and design eye. He was able to take what is a fairly small front yard with basically grass and a dying tree in it that was cracking our foundation and really transform it into something beautiful. It is a really pretty front yard now utilizing the existing framework. We have a flow river that is made out of rocks and it is just really nice and low maintenance, which is good for us because we are terrible. We are not lawn people, so if you are not a lawn person it is nice to have zeroscaping, and it still fits in. I wanted to redo the whole driveway with concrete but he said no and said that I could do it when it is really bad but it was fine right now. He said we could just repair it because the color was bright white and it was really going to stand out and not look good. He has a very good design eye and gave a very honest assessment. He has great workers, so he is not doing a lot of the work himself. He is basically the designer, and he designs and quotes everything himself. How workers were also low key and unobtrusive. There was a lot of digging, moving and pounding and stuff going on but it was very neat. They cleaned up everyday, so there no hazards or anything like that. They put in nice lighting and it was a great crew and very reliable. I don’t know them pretty well but they seemed very honest and hardworking. They were working every time I looked out and nobody was taking long breaks. If we can one day afford to use them in the backyard, we would.

Creative Scapes was an approved landscaper that worked with our designer, Kimberly Marshall of Roberta Walker Landscape Design, and Roger Pajo initially seemed like a good match. When a misunderstanding occurred in the design stage, he was willing to work with Kimberly and I on the plan so it would fit within our budget. But once work started in late October, there were all kinds of issues: he stored his bobcat here for 2 months (well after the actual bobcat work was finished), he took out mature plants that were meant to stay (completely preventable, if he had actually looked at the plans--he rarely had them onhand and relied on his memory), and created drainage issues where there had been none before. His guys also drove the bobcat onto our concrete walkway (instead of taking it around to the double wide gates on that side) and cracked part of the concrete--he poured a new section, but it doesn't even begin to blend in with the existing. What's more, the plants were put in the ground sloppily and half of them died. He offered a warranty on those and did replace the majority of them, but only after I called Roberta Walker and she put some pressure on him. The irrigation he installed had problem after problem--he must have come out a dozen times to fix it (but to be fair, he did come out) and it contributed to the plant loss. We may lose some mature trees as well, since the irrigation did not allow for the trees being used to sprinklers. He didn't finish compacting the rear decomposed granite patio until June 2013, and it was unusable until then--but still has drainage issues. So although we love the look of the paths and planting beds in the yard, we're now in a position of looking for another landscaper to fix the drainage and rear patio area, and add an irrigation zone for the trees. It was harder and harder to get Roger to return calls and keep appointments, and I'm opting not to deal with him any longer. At the time, I was recovering from cancer treatments and didn't really have the energy to argue with him or stress over it too much--but I feel he took advantage of this at times, by putting our job as a lower priority. Some photos of the finished project and work-in-progress can be seen at http://www.angelicarjackson.com/Fine-Art-Photos/Gardens/Drought-Tolerant-Landscaping

They have been great so far. The owner has been very responsive and really nice. The workers are also great.