Environmental Landscape Associates

Around the beginning of the summer of 2015 I contacted Environmental Landscape Associates, Inc (ELA) in Doylestown, PA, regarding a water feature I was contemplating for my back yard in Bucks County, PA. I met with their water feature manager who discussed and explained various options to me. After visiting my property to discuss the project further, ELA provided a written proposal to me that included a drawing of a small waterfall with a bending stream into a small pond. The total footprint of the water feature was approximately 8? x 13?. The proposal and the design were acceptable to me except for the proposed aquatic plants. We discussed the choice of plants through emails and I instead chose different aquatic plants that were not listed in the original proposal and ELA agreed to use my recommended plants. I gave ELA a $2,500 deposit on Aug 27, 2015 when I accepted the proposal. The installation of the water feature started on Sept 8, 2015 and the installation was completed on Sept 10, 2015 and I paid the $3,415.70 balance due. I will note that despite the emails I exchanged with ELA regarding the types of aquatic plants they still brought the wrong plants for the water feature. Missing that detail should have indicated to me their installation work was not detail oriented.

Unfortunately, I paid ELA too early because the very next week on Sep 18, 2015 I informed ELA that the water feature was not retaining water and appeared to have a leak.  In the 10 days since the installation the water feature lost approximately 3 inches of water and required me to refill it with the garden hose.  Over the next 5 weeks ELA sporadically worked on my water feature to fix the leak, but they had no success and admitted they were stumped. At this point they left my water feature in a partially excavated state. More than 2 weeks passed without ELA contacting me about their plans to fix the leak so I gave them an 18-day deadline to fix it. No one from ELA showed up at my property during that 18-day period to work on the water feature or in the 10 days since the end of the deadline, which makes it nearly 6-7 weeks since they last attempted to fix the leak. Needless to say, my water feature is still in a partially excavated state and every week or two I now have to fill the water feature with the garden hose.

I give ELA a failing grade of D for installing a defective water feature and my advice to those who may still want to use ELA for a water feature installation is do not make your final payment until 2 weeks after the installation is complete to ensure it does not contain any leaks.

What a truly terrible experience that I regret. I hired ELA to do a landscape design project, and they spent several months and delivered something in the end that was completely unusable.  They are very convincing sales people, and will spend alot of time convincing you they are proud of their work and professional. Instead it is literally one of the worst experiences I ever had with a contractor, and truly regret ever getting involved with them.  The ultimate quote they gave me (for thier unusable design) was also ridiculous.  I would stay away from this contractor!

These guys are great. Keith, the owner, came by and mapped out the whole thing. His vision was wonderfully creative and he was very responsive to what I wanted, while also giving me good advice. His workers were prompt, neat, and very easy to deal with. The finished product is gorgeous. I got to pick out my plants and they helped me find things that would grow well in the space without a lot of work. The workmanship on the patio, fence and steps is top notch. It was expensive, but the price was fair for all they did for me. I'm sure I increased the value of my home much more than I paid. I now have a beautiful backyard.

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I like Environmental Landscape Associates a lot. The owner was the one who created the estimate. He is a young guy but super, super intelligent. He did his job very, very well. He knew everything upfront. They were probably the best people I have dealt with with regard to contractor.

They did a very good and I was very pleased with it. The owner is very hands on, he had a lot of ideas. They did everything that they said they are going to do, the quality of their work was good, it was on time and it was on budget. They did an excellent job. I would hire them again in the second.

Had gotten 3-4 estimates and plans from a few companies.  Our back yard is very small and if I could I wanted to utilize the entire space for entertaining.  Their design stood out as the most complete and elaborate of the bunch and used much more area than the others.
The price started to rise drastically though most notably because of township requirements for drainage rather than the company's doing.  They do add 10% additional cost to supplies so we arrange for the granite top ourselves.  Some supplies are inevitably best to stay in their control.  
There were some delays from weather and such but once started fairly efficient with beautiful results.  Dave Busch was my landscape architect and he was always responsive to emails, phone calls and texts addressing all issues and concerns.  
They were very flexible to any changes.  The crew was always professional and courteous.  Upon completion of work they cleaned up everything and even power washed both the new patio/deck area and our driveway that had a month of dirt on it after all the work was done.  
I foresee them being equally as responsive to any issues that happen after they leave as they were during the process.
Don't expect their work to be cheap!  These guys will use the best supplies and the best subcontractors.  Their plans will always be more elaborate and extensive than most of the other companies.
But you will love what they do and you will have results that speak for themselves and worth the cost.  They will make the outcome unique and amazing!

Very well - started early & worked all day.

Started at a greed date, They stocked workers for 6 days, cauful consultation in planning and in follow up with workers.