How Much Should I Spend on a New Garden?

By: Annie

Without fail, new clients are mystified by the cost of a new garden. And who can blame them? A new garden is not something you can buy on Amazon. We provide budget brackets to choose from on our contact form so you can get a sense for what’s normal, but the reality is that there are so many variables involved in landscape design that it’s almost impossible to give one figure to a client. Or even a simple formula.

So, how how are people supposed to know how much to budget for a new garden? How long is a piece of garden twine? You should imagine it like a home remodel - it’s all dependent on your choices throughout the process, but you can imagine the cost as similar to the construction cost of remodeling a room. Following are the variables that affect the cost of a new landscape design to help give you an idea.

Where are you located?

Obviously some areas of the country have a higher cost of living, and that affects the cost of hiring labor and buying plants grown on more expensive land. Some areas have the issue of remoteness - in Hawai’i for example many materials can be very costly as they’ve been shipped over to the islands.

Where you live also affects the type of soil you have, and as a result the type of plants that will grow there. With extremely fast draining sandy soil, or very heavy, wet clay soil, some soil amendment will need to be brought in to improve either moisture retention or drainage. The costs here include the new material, delivery, and installation, and also maybe removal and disposal of the old material.

How big is your garden?

Affecting the cost of materials like plant, soils, mulches and gravels for your project is the amount of square footage they have to cover.

Do you have hungry wildlife?

If you have gophers and want to grow the type of plants that gophers like to eat, the cost of planting in gopher baskets, and the baskets themselves, is not insignificant. Similarly, deer, rabbits and other critters will need to be fenced out unless you are fine with your new garden being a fabulous salad bar for the “locals.”

How many trees do you need, and how big should they be?

Trees are an essential part of landscape design, bringing shade, privacy and beauty to the garden. They can also be pretty slow growing, and to start to appear “tree sized” - that is, 5-8’ tall with a trunk of about 2-3” in diameter - you need at least a 15 gallon pot size. The cost is lower than larger sizes, if you don’t mind the wait. To get the impact of a real tree right away though, you’re better off with something a bit older. 

Trees generally come in 24”, 36”, 48” and 60” box sizes, and of course the bigger they are, the more expensive they are. Added to that is the requirement to have a special delivery in a truck big enough to hold them, plus potentially a crane for the biggest sizes, and the cost goes up right away. Planting a bigger tree means digging a bigger hole and more preparation too. You can see how that might add up.

How much patience do you have?

The same as trees, other plants come in all sorts of pot sizes. Some grow very quickly - there might be 6 to 12 months of growth between a 1 gallon and a 5 gallon sized Salvia leucantha, for example. So, unless you want a mature looking garden fairly quickly, it’s straightforward to choose smaller versions of those plants if you need to cut costs.

Other plants grow painfully slowly. Many aloes, agaves, cacti and the like take years or even decades of perfect growing to get to a reasonable size. That makes larger versions more expensive, but definitely the right choice so you can enjoy them right away.

What style of garden do you like? Sparse or jungly?

The closer plants are spaced, the more plants you need in a design. Generally, unless a client expresses a desire either way, we design so that plants at their mature size will just touch the plants next to them, covering bare ground and suppressing weeds while creating a lush, full look. Some people prefer a desert vibe, with specimen plants spaced far apart. It’s up to you, but when going for the sparse look don’t overdo it - your garden will start to look unintentionally meager.

Do you like rare plants?

Got Aloe polyphylla tastes, but a geranium budget? If you’re a big fan of the rare and unusual you may already know they come with a price - particularly at a large size. However, there’s usually an alternative plant that can be sourced for less but has the attributes you’re looking for. If you wanted a 4-5’ tall Yucca rostrata and didn’t have $2,000 to spend, we might suggest a Cordyline for $300, for example, with the same upright form, trunk, and burst of foliage at the top.

What about water?

How will you water the plants to establish them? If you’ve read our article on irrigation, you’ll know that all plants will need water for the first few months to a year to get established. After that? Not so much. Adding an irrigation system adds costs of course - but a smart move might be planting your garden in the winter, when free water falls out of the sky!

Hardscape and more

Mulch, gravel, rock work, and all the other hardscape elements, including lighting, have highly variable costs as well. We always give alternatives to meet your budget, and explain the pros and cons of each choice.

What kind of help do you need? 

We specialize in design and installation - the full service. But we can also do design only, or deliver design plus all the plants you need to install yourself if you’re a keen gardener. 

People often come to us after trying to get a “mow and blow” landscaping company to create a well designed garden, or after using an online designer who leaves them high and dry to find all the plants and figure out how to install them. The wasted expense of this type of experiment is painful to see.

In a similar vein, we charge an hourly rate for design, so if you’re decisive, so much the better for your budget!

How does it add up?

To help you get an idea of how each of these factors affect cost, let’s look at two average 1,000 square foot gardens in Northern California and compare costs.

Garden A has heavy clay soil, and the client has decided they want to grow plants that won’t tolerate that kind of abuse. They bring in 30 yards of compost and new soil to amend the clay, and two days are spent removing old soil to the dump, adding new soil, and mixing it in.

This client wants to add three somewhat more costly 36” box trees and some larger specimen plants, including a hedge of 15g Pittosporums, which results in higher delivery and installation costs too. They prefer a higher planting density and would like a few more rare or unusual plants - some tree aloes and larger agaves. Their area is overrun with gophers and they know every plant must be in a basket, or they risk losing their investment. They also prefer not to water plants that need it by hand, so an irrigation system is designed, and they enjoy entertaining in their garden in the evenings, so they want a low voltage lighting system to be installed too, next to a flagstone patio with decomposed granite pathways all around, bordered with steel edging, the design punctuated by some larger feature boulders that really make a statement.

When all is said and done, their estimate is in the region of $75k.

Garden B, right next door has somewhat better soil - over the years the client has amended it. They also want to use some native and other plants that tolerate the variable soil, and the gophers, a little better. They know they’ll be living in their home for the long haul, so they are OK with some faster-growing 15g trees. Similarly, their planting density and pot size is smaller. They’re even going to hand water all the plants to establish them, so no irrigation is required. 

This garden comes in closer to $25k.

An investment

As you can see, all the choices a homeowner makes during the course of their landscape design affect the cost greatly, but the return on that investment can be huge - we wrote a blog post about that subject recently. 

If you’d like an estimate on a new garden, feel free to contact us and we can arrange a site visit to assess the area and get a feel for what you’re looking for in your new outdoor space.