Emily Russell, Registered Landscape Architect

She just came out here and did a plan. Very knowledgeable, educated professional, prompt and her good buy for the service.

We chose to hire a landscape architect to guide us in the makeover of our front yard because we wanted to make such dramatic changes. Not only did we plan to replace the grass with a Northwest-friendly   low maintenance landscape, but we also wanted to add a parking pad, a new walkway and seating area, and to change our front entry. We knew what we wanted, but wondered if it was even possible on our steeply-graded lot. We clearly needed the services of an expert who would be able put all of the things on our wish list into a workable plan. We found Russell Design Source on Angie?s List. Emily Russell responded quickly to our initial contact and worked with our schedule to visit our property.  Emily listened well and seemed to catch our vision.  She took into consideration that the plan might ultimately have to be completed in stages. After the initial visit when she took lots of measurements and pictures, Emily drew up a detailed plan. We met twice more with her and were in contact via email throughout the process. She was easy to work with and was always quick to answer our questions and concerns. Emily produced a workable plan which included every detail-- from the placement of specific plant varieties to elevations for landscaping and hardscape surfaces. Emily even helped us find a competent contractor to do the work. The makeover of our yard is now nearly complete.  We love everything about it and are glad that we started the process with a professional like Emily Russell.

Ms. Russell gave me drawings of redesigning my gardens/landscapes at 2 houses. I really like the fact that she listed options of plants based on our walk-thru of what I wanted and even more importantly what I didn't want. She was prompt, professional and very easy to talk to in laymans terms (since I am not a gardener).

Our front yard was in bad shape -- sloping toward the street, mostly moss with sparse grass, surrounded by a rock wall and uneven concrete steps leading from the front of the house to the street level. We contracted with Ms. Russell for landscape design services -- to design a more modern and welcoming front to our home/yard. She came out and measured and photographed the area and spoke with us at length. We had little idea of what we wanted. A previous contractor had suggested a series of terraced levels, but the cost was prohibitive and access to street level would have been limited to only our steps or driveway. Ms. Russell made some initial suggestions during our walkthrough and then emailed and visited several more times before coming up with a preliminary plan. Once we came to agreement on the overall plan, she provided us with suggested lists of plantings and between us we came up with a list of those that would work for our yard. The final formal landscape drawing -- provided in both hard copy as well as electronic copy -- reconfigured and updated our yard, reused large rocks from our old rock wall as focal points within the planting areas, and served as an excellent document for obtaining bids from contractors. Ms. Russell was attentive to our needs, provided clearly expert advice, and the final product was a professionally produced landscape drawing showing elevations, measurements, features, and plantings.
In addition to the contracted work, Ms. Russell made a suggestion about our old concrete block retaining wall in our back yard that we used when we replaced our concrete patio with pavers. Based on her suggestion, we were able to save the cost of replacing the retaining wall and still have a clean, modern look to our patio.
One last comment: We've lived in our home for 33 years, and thought mowing our lawn and having the standard rectangular planting area along the front of the house was ok. Ever since we had our yard re-landscaped according to Ms. Russell's plan we have been proud of our yard and happy to see it when driving up the street.

The service went fabulously!!!