Common Questions
The Answers Hartford County Homeowners Want Before They Call
Pulled from thirteen years of conversations with West Hartford, Avon, Simsbury and Farmington homeowners. Straight answers, no fluff.
We serve West Hartford, Avon, Simsbury, Farmington, Canton, New Hartford, Granby and Burlington. That covers most of northwest Hartford County and the eastern edge of Litchfield County.
We stay close to home on purpose. Tight geography means we can be on your property quickly if something needs attention, we know the soil and the drainage patterns in your specific neighborhood, and we have built enough projects nearby that we usually have a reference photo from a house close to yours.
Most of our hardscape and outdoor living projects start around $20,000. We do larger custom transformations up to $200,000 and occasionally beyond.
For longtime clients we have worked with for years, we will happily come back for smaller projects: installing a granite bench, a bubbling boulder, fixing something small. That is part of the long-term relationship.
For new clients, $20,000 is roughly where the math starts to work for both sides. Below that, the cost of mobilizing our crew, our equipment, and our insurance for the job leaves you paying a lot more per square foot than you would on a bigger project. We will happily tell you that on the first phone call and point you toward someone better-suited if your project is smaller.
The first phone call is always free and takes about ten minutes. If we are a good fit, we book a property visit that is also free.
We do not give estimates over the phone. Backyard projects have too many variables (grade, drainage, access, material choices, existing conditions) to price honestly without walking the property in person.
Yes. We have been a Connecticut Home Improvement Contractor since 2012, fully insured with a $2 million umbrella policy, and we carry workers’ compensation coverage on every crew member.
Registration numbers and certificates are available on request before any work starts.
Most transformations finish in three to four weeks of build time once we are on site.
The planning phase before that, including the blueprint if you choose to get one, typically adds two to four weeks. So most projects move from “yes, let’s do this” to “finished backyard” in five to eight weeks.
Larger projects with water features, retaining walls and lighting systems can run six to eight weeks of build time. We give you the exact timeline in the contract before we start.
The blueprint is a professionally-drafted to-scale drawing of your transformed backyard. It shows exactly where every plant, stone, fixture and feature will go.
We recommend it for any project over $5,000 or for backyards with multiple moving parts. John works with Aaron, a landscape architect at Mapletree Nursery, who handles the drawing directly with you. Aaron bills hourly at $150 an hour, so most blueprints land between $350 and $600 depending on complexity.
You pay Aaron directly. The blueprint is yours to keep regardless of who eventually builds the project. We use it to price the build and to put together a detailed itemized contract.
A real blueprint is your insurance policy on the project.
It lets you compare quotes from different contractors apples to apples instead of guessing whether one quote covers bluestone and another covers cheap concrete pavers. It tells the contractor exactly who, what, when, where and why is going to happen on your property. It removes the surprises that turn projects into disputes.
It also lets you sequence work over time. If you have a five-year vision but only this year’s budget, the blueprint shows you which phase to tackle first so you do not have to undo it later.
Spring and summer projects get booked starting in February. Fall and winter are when we plan, design and price for the next building season.
If you want first pick of spring build dates, the best time to call is between December and February. If you call in late spring, we will still try to fit you in, but the calendar fills up quickly.
Our specialty is hardscape and backyard transformations: patios, water features, fire features, retaining walls, walkways, drainage, and full property design.
We do offer maintenance services for clients we already have a hardscape relationship with, but for new clients looking specifically for lawn cutting and mulch, we are not the right fit and we will say so honestly. We can recommend someone who specializes in that work.
A few reasons, in order of how much they actually affect your project:
● Real equipment. We bring $200,000 to $300,000 of professional gear to every job. That is what makes the difference between a boulder wall that looks intentional and a boulder wall that looks improvised.
● Real insurance. Our $2 million umbrella policy protects your property and your home if something goes wrong during the build. Many lower-cost contractors carry minimal insurance or none at all.
● Trained crew, not day labor. Our crew has worked together for years. They know how to read a print, set a stone, and rebuild a section if something is not right.
● Materials that survive Connecticut. The cheap paver from the big-box store does not survive ten freeze-thaw cycles. We use materials that hold up to Connecticut weather for ten and twenty years.
We are not the cheapest. We tell people that on the first call. Most of our clients hire us specifically because they tried the cheapest option once and ended up paying twice.
You call John on his cell phone. We come back and make it right.
If a paver settles, we re-set it. If a joint opens up, we re-fill it. If a piece of stone shifted out of alignment, we fix it. There is no separate service department to navigate, no warranty paperwork to fill out, no extra invoice.
This is the part of the work nobody sees but everyone needs. It is one of the main reasons we are still in business after thirteen years.
Yes. This is one of the ways the blueprint pays for itself.
If you have a five-year vision but only this year’s budget, we sequence the work so each phase sets up the next one. The retaining wall and grading happens first because you cannot put a patio on an unstable slope. Conduit for future lighting gets buried during the patio install so we are not tearing up your stones two years later to run wire. The water feature waits until the hardscape is built so the plumbing is right.
Ten thousand dollars this year, ten thousand next year, ten thousand the year after, that is a totally reasonable way to work with us. We have clients we have been building for in phases for five and six years.
Yes, and almost every backyard in West Hartford and the surrounding towns has some kind of drainage issue.
We install French drains, channel drains, dry wells, downspout extensions and integrated drainage as part of larger transformations. We also do drainage-only projects when that is what a property needs.
Drainage is the unglamorous foundation under every project that lasts. We handle it before any patio or wall goes in. Skipping it is the most common reason backyards fail two and three years after the build.
We do not offer direct financing.
We do work with clients on multi-year build plans where you spread the project across building seasons. Most projects use a deposit up front and milestone payments tied to specific phases in the contract. We can build a payment schedule that works for your budget when we put the contract together.
For pavers and walls we use Techo-Bloc, Belgard, Unilock and Cambridge. For natural stone we use Connecticut fieldstone and bluestone, locally quarried whenever possible. For water features we use Aquascape components. For low-voltage lighting we use FX Luminaire and Vista Pro.
Specific material choices depend on the architecture of your home, your taste, and what will hold up best in Connecticut over the long term. The blueprint lists every material by name and quantity so there is zero ambiguity when the contract gets signed.
No. Most of our clients are at work during the day.
We send progress photos every day or two depending on what you prefer. You have John’s cell phone if you ever need to reach him. We coordinate with you in advance for the few moments when a decision needs your direct input, like choosing between two stone samples or signing off on a layout before we set the final course.
The crew is fully self-sufficient on site. They have keys to the dumpster, access to the water spigot, and a port-a-potty if the project is large enough to need one. You come home to a clean job site every day.
No. Most of our clients are at work during the day.
We send progress photos every day or two depending on what you prefer. You have John’s cell phone if you ever need to reach him. We coordinate with you in advance for the few moments when a decision needs your direct input, like choosing between two stone samples or signing off on a layout before we set the final course.
The crew is fully self-sufficient on site. They have keys to the dumpster, access to the water spigot, and a port-a-potty if the project is large enough to need one. You come home to a clean job site every day.
Call (860) 200-3506 between Monday and Friday, 8 AM to 5 PM.
The first conversation is a ten-minute phone call with John. He will ask a few questions about your property and what you have in mind. If we are a fit, we book a property visit. If we are not, he will tell you straight and usually recommend someone who is.
No pressure. No commitment. No sales pitch