Oct 30, 2026 · Emily Hanekroot
If your project is under about $50,000 and simple, go straight to a good contractor. Above that, a landscape designer stops being a luxury and becomes the thing that protects your budget.
Here's a question we ask clients: would you spend $300,000 on anything without a detailed plan? Most people wouldn't buy a car that way, let alone build a house. Yet plenty of landscapes get built from a contractor's quick sketch and a verbal brief.
One of our favourite projects started with a contractor saying exactly this. Anne and Andrew had a difficult sloping block in Bright and spoke to several landscapers. One of them, a colleague of ours, told them honestly that they needed a proper plan to get the most out of their property. So they called us.
That's the point of this post. It isn't really designer versus contractor. Good contractors know when a job needs a designer, and good designers make contractors' lives easier. The real question is when you need both.
When going straight to a contractor is the right call
We'll be honest: not every job needs a designer. If the scope is simple and the outcome is obvious, a good contractor is all you need.
Replacing a failed retaining wall and fixing up the turf around it is a good example. There's one clear problem, one clear fix, and not much to design.
Our rule of thumb is budget. Once a project goes past about $50,000, or more realistically $75,000 these days, you're usually better off with a designer. At that level there are too many decisions, trades and hidden costs to leave to a quote and a handshake.
Signs your project has outgrown "just a landscaper"
If you're already talking to contractors, these are the moments to stop and get someone in your corner:
You've lost track of why it's so expensive. The numbers keep climbing and nobody can show you where the money is going.
Components keep getting forgotten. Lighting, drainage or edging appears as an "extra" halfway through.
You don't have a clear picture of what you're buying. You're about to spend a lot of money and can't see the finished result.
You're not convinced by the solutions on offer. Something in the proposal doesn't feel right, but you can't say what.
Each of these comes back to the same gap: not enough detail. A detailed plan lets you specify exactly what you want, so contractors can price it accurately.
"Isn't a designer a luxury I can't afford?"
This is the misconception we hear most, and on a larger project it's simply untrue. A designer is how you make sure your money goes to the right places before you start paying contractors.
As a guide, landscape design costs about 5 to 10% of the construction cost, depending on complexity. On a $300,000 garden, that's $15,000 to $30,000 to plan the whole thing properly.
That fee almost always pays for itself in headaches avoided: the problems that would otherwise surface long after the landscapers have packed up and left.
Good design can mean you don't get everything on your wish list in stage one. That's because a designer makes sure the hidden layers of a landscape are done properly first, and those layers take real budget. Skip them and you get a pretty garden that lasts a short time before things start going wrong.
The hidden layers you won't see on a quote
The most important parts of a landscape are the ones you never look at. These are the four we see skipped most often.
Drainage
If drainage isn't properly addressed before anything is built on top, every layer above it is at risk. Water will find its way. On sloping High Country blocks it usually finds your paving, your walls or your house.
Soil preparation
New builds often have all the topsoil stripped from the site. Unless it's replaced with soil suited to your planting, you're risking $10,000, $20,000 or even $30,000 worth of plants failing.
Irrigation
We insist clients include irrigation in their design. Establishing a whole garden by hand watering is an enormous job, even for a professional.
This matters even more for holiday homes. With an automated system, you're not asking friends to water in the middle of a heatwave while you're overseas skiing. It also uses less water, and you can control it remotely when the forecast turns hot and you're not there.
Retaining walls
This is where we see the biggest savings when the landscape is planned at the house concept stage. The builder can include retaining walls in the house build, instead of leaving an unsightly site cut that's very expensive to fix once the house is in the way.
Too often the builder puts in a cheap structural sleeper wall, and we're left to deal with how it looks.
Maintenance Plan
A whole new garden needs care and attention to establish and you are going to need help and advice regardless of whether you’re an avid gardener. We provide maintenance notes for the technical details needed to get the best from your garden as well as to make sure the garden matures to the design intent. We can also provide maintenance oversight for your garden so you have us taking responsibility well after the project is complete.
Landscape problems vs lifestyle problems
This is the real difference between the two. Contractors solve landscape problems. Designers solve the problem of making your landscape fit your lifestyle.
Contractor-designed landscapes are often simpler, and that's why they're cheaper. But they're simple because they don't start by asking how you want to live in the space.
That's where our design process starts. How many people do you want to host? Where do the kids play? Where does the morning sun hit, and where do you want privacy from the road? The answers shape everything that gets built.
Case study: Anne and Andrew, Bright VIC
After their contractor referred them to us, we visited the site and worked through their brief, goals and the outcomes they wanted. We then produced detailed plans they were very happy with. They felt so comfortable with the process that they asked us to stay on for project delivery, to keep the same level of service through construction.
Without a design, they'd have missed several opportunities on that block. What they ended up with:
More usable space for bigger gatherings with family and friends
A new driveway layout so guests can arrive and stay
Erosion solved on the slope, before it could undermine the new work
Bushfire Risk mitigated with the right planting and layouts
Privacy where they needed it most
Lower maintenance, thanks to planting chosen for the site and how they live
They were so pleased that they wrote us a full-page review, especially about the project management phase. In their words:
"We initially hesitated to engage Emily to project manage the construction phase as a money saving thought, but we are glad we went ahead and engaged her in this role. The devil is in the detail and Emily was all over the detail, ensuring our design was delivered by the construction team as intended."
"I am sure we would not have achieved the same result without Emily's assistance with both design and project oversight."
The best of both: how designer and contractor work together
The best results come from a designer and a contractor on the same team, from early on. Here's how that works with us.
When to bring us in
Best: At the same time as your architect. We do a site visit together, talk about the site's strengths and the problems we can see, and make sure the flow from inside to outside is well connected. That's how you avoid ugly site cuts and makeshift concrete sleeper walls.
Next best: Once your architect has locked in the concept. We give feedback on how the landscape connects to the house and how it should sit around it so the architect can consider our early ideas before they detail your house plans and we can collaborate closely.
Bringing in the contractor early
At concept stage we bring in potential contractors, and we'll usually already have one in mind who's a good fit. Together we talk through solutions, budgets and whether our proposed methods are feasible. That means a far more realistic estimate at the end of the design process.
Tendering
If you engage us for project management (which we highly recommend), we run the tender. We turn the detailed design into a scope of works and make sure trades price every item on it. We also check nothing has been missed, including anything we may have overlooked in the plans, so you get a clear, complete price.
A word of warning about the cheapest quote. A very low price often means the contractor hasn't worked through the detail, and they'll make it up in variations during the job.
Managing variations during construction
During the build, we:
Check every variation against the scope of works
Discuss solutions before anything is built
Make sure you approve every variation before it goes ahead
Track all extra spending on top of the contract value, so there's no nasty surprise at the end
That's the "devil in the detail" Anne and Andrew were talking about.
The verdict
For a small, simple job, call a good contractor. For anything over about $50,000 to $75,000, especially on a sloping site, a new build or a holiday home you won't always be at, a landscape designer is an essential step, not a luxury one.
The earlier you bring us in, the more we can save you. Ideally that's alongside your architect, before the first retaining wall is drawn.
Ready to talk about your project? Book an initial call and we'll find out more about your site and plans, and how we can best be involved.
