Offerings

We’d love to have the opportunity to help you with whatever needs you may have for your property, whether you’re in a new construction home or your outdoors just needs a makeover.  We can be reached at (920)830-4550.  We’d love to hear from you!

Brick Paver Patios, Driveways

I personally began installing paver patios just over 20 years ago, working in a more developed hardscape market not so far away from Appleton, Wisconsin, working under people that had been in the same field for over a decade. This was back when guillotine-style splitters were used to break pavers, instead of the light, fast, powerful cut-off saws we use today.

A lot have things have changed since then - compaction equipment does a far better job than it did back then, resulting in better base preps, which means a longer-lasting brick pavement. Measuring tools are better, too. Where we used to use a sight level to shoot grades we now use lasers. It’s faster and orders of magnitude more accurate. Polymeric sand made obsolete the need to re-sweep paver joint sand every season. So many things we’ve learned and improved on over the years, it’s hard to think of them all.

Retaining Walls

Concrete block and stone (and sometimes landscape timbers or railroad ties) are used routinely to engineer earth retainers designed to provide more usable yard space. Or make a steep grade safer. Or to stop erosion. They can also be built to create grade changes on a property where the are none, adding visual interest and giving opportunities for softscape plantings around these hardscape structures to really show their beauty. Important to the design and construction of a retaining wall (especially in the Fox Valley area of Wisconsin where heavy clay soils abound) is an understanding of how the structures work in native soils. That knowledge and a familiarity with new tools and technologies gives us the ability to design and build retaining walls that are both functional and beautiful for years.

Landscape Plantings

There’s something about a big tree that makes me feel good. Wisdom and benevelonce seem to permeate the air underneath a big maple or oak tree. They help change the look of a new construction home in the Fox Cities from bare and exposed to settled and established. We select trees from the most industry-recognized, reputable growers in the area, preferring to plant larger caliper, character-changing trees on the Wisconsin properties where we work. Once we’ve established the upper leaf canopy, we move to low ground, including shrubs, evergreens (trees and shrubs), perennials and groundcovers, filling a property from earth to sky with green goodness.

Ponds and Waterfalls

They experienced a huge surge in popularity beginning about a decade ago, but despite the wonderful UV filters, biofalls and biofilters, beneficial bacteria and skimmer boxes, one thing that was true a decade ago is still true today: ponds and waterfalls will require your time. Time to manage the aglae growth. Time to manage the pH balance of the water and feed the fish (should you choose to stock your pond with fish). Time to periodically clean the skimmer box to prevent the pump from running dry and burning up. If these are things you aren’t all that enthusiastic about doing, I might try to twist your arm to get you to consider something different; nothing is more disappointing than to see a water feature fall into a state of disrepair because a client didn’t realize the time commitment it involved.

If you are game for that kind of time commitment, we can build a custom water feature of any size for you, anywhere from Appleton to Neenah (or even beyond the borders of Wisconsin’s Fox Valley). We’ve built ponds no larger than a kitchen table and ponds that hold 70,000 gallons of water (that’s a lot). We can build a waterfall without a pond, reducing the amount of maintenance you’ll need to perform, or we can make this a full outdoor hobby, with koi, goldfish, cattails and water lilies. The works. (The frogs will find their way over on their own.)

Pergolas, Arbors, Fences and Decks

We try to bring our special flavor to everything we do, and that includes the outdoor wood structures we build for residents of Wisconsin’s Fox Cities. That might mean ornamenting a wood structure with wrought iron, or bending the laws of physics and lumber by constructing a curved pergola or arbor. Built as a shade structure, a screen, a pet container or a place to lounge, our wood construction has the same aesthetic qualities and durability as everything we build.

Masonry

Several years ago I felt that we were losing out on opportunities in our landscape constructions. Not that we were losing work, but rather missing the chance to build something really spectacular. Most landscape contractors in Appleton or Neenah can build walls or other structures out of retaining wall block, but almost none can do it with masonry. And while those block can look really very nice, in certain situations and for certain exteriors, a retaining wall block aesthetically is just not the appropriate material, and a mortared solution is the only one right for the project. Seeing how our design possibilities would be opened up by adding masonry, we sought out and hired an excellent mason from the area who spent much of his time teaching our staff all of the intricacies of mortar work, and now we’re bringing that knowledge and skill to you.

Lawn Seeding / Sodding

If you have a new construction home and are in need of some of the green stuff, we offer hydroseeding or sod to make your lawn child and dog approved. Like a lot of things in landscaping, and construction in general in the Fox Cities, some of the most important work we do is work you’ll never see until well after we’ve moved on to our next projects. For lawn work, it’s the grading. Every new subdivision from Appleton to Neenah has an engineered drainage plan; a design to account for the flow of surface/rain water so that it ends up where it’s supposed to, in storm sewers or detention and retention ponds at predefined locations in your subdivision. For that plan to work, every neighbor has to have their property graded according to the specs for their lot (specifically, the elevations at the property lines around your home).

A failure here means that either water will be standing in your yard or a neighbor’s yard. Grass won’t grow there, and neither will the friendship with your neighbor. But mosquitos will love it. We make sure our grading work is done according to the engineered drainage plan using the most accurate tools available to our industry: lasers. While it sounds futuristic and maybe even a bit dangerous, it’s not. We don’t even have to wear hazmat suits like the men pictured. Simply put, a self-leveling laser emits an extremely narrow beam of light that’s picked up by the person working the rod/detector. With these tools he can determine (with accuracy of +/- 1/4″ per 100′) the exact elevation of the spot he’s taking the measurement from, allowing us to make adjustments up or down in the grade to meet the specs of the drainage plan.

This means water flows where it’s supposed to, giving you the best opportunity for a great lawn. From there we’ll use the best ingredients available (quality seed and starter fertilizers, hydromulch, tackifier and sometimes a man-made fiber for erosion control purposes) (or 2 year-old sod from the best local growers) to cook up a full, lush lawn for you and your family. We can even provide a temporary irrigation system for you if you’d like!

Low Voltage Lighting

Have you ever been in the backyard of a well-lit landscape in Wisconsin? Illuminated pathways and highlighted landscape elements give off visual warmth to the area. It makes you feel safe and welcome. It also provides you with more space for entertaining by defining a larger area for use by your guests. People can be like moths to a flame; if you have one sterile lamp by the patio door, people won’t venture much beyond the reach of that 100 watt bulb. Light the paths, trees and statuary of your backyard and the entire area feels like a gathering place. People will mill about the yard, taking in the beauty of your landscape and the night sky. Your yard will be a much more fun place to be.

Do you like what you see so far? Visit our landscaping company site to learn more, or call to schedule an appointment at (920)830-4550. We serve Appleton, Neenah and all of Wisconsin’s Fox River Valley.