I initially hired Natalie to design a greywater system in 2015 and have been working with her ever…read moresince. Natalie has designed and installed our 2,000 gallon rainwater system, a laundry-to-landscape system, and a shower branched-drain system for us. She's also provided invaluable consulting and design support for my edible garden over the years. Not only is Natalie an absolute professional - her quality of work is great, and she's completely reliable - but she's such an amazing teacher. Working with Natalie has been like having my own private permaculture instructor. With her kind and patient support, I've learned how to nurture my little plot of earth to create a beautiful and nourishing mini-farm for my family.

I'm so grateful to have met Natalie and to have her as a resource. She is a knowledgeable,…read morereliable, hardworking gardener/farmer who obviously has a passion for what she does. She is also friendly, easy going, and professional. We usually go through the garden together and talk about what my goals are, and she makes suggestions throughout and lets me know about how long things will take. Then she works tirelessly to accomplish it all. She's done an excellent job pruning our trees, which is definitely more of an art than a science, and not something I can easily trust others to do properly. She's the kind of person who can adapt to whatever level of information or service you need. For example, my husband is a big picture person who just wants the garden to be well maintained. I'm a detail oriented person who wants to plan out the organic vegetable garden and go over exactly what is needed to make sure it's a success. She also has a gift for creating beautiful vegetable gardens. She brings over her magic ingredients to make your vegetable garden special - things like flowering cover crops to enhance your soil, heirloom beans to climb your fences, lovely bulbs to throw in here and there, healthy starts, straw to balance all that green in your compost, and mulch for your pathways. She is also very strong and has amazing endurance. I can't believe how much she can accomplish in one day! She's been a great resource for us, giving us tips on where to buy things, what to buy, and giving inexpensive alternatives. She also offers to bring things to us when she comes (seeds, straw, mulch). She'll identify the pests on your plants and trees, and make suggestions on how to treat them organically. If she's pulling out old plants, she'll save the edible portions for you and make suggestions on what to do with them. She can also set up or fix your irrigation system. Whatever we've needed in our garden, Natalie has been able help us accomplish it.

Kathy did plant and irrigation designs for us. Never trying to sell us anything, she listened to…read moreour needs and provided us with beautiful drawings. She always helped us think ahead. What a pleasure!

Frustrating experience. Communication was unprofessional and disrespectful of our time. We had her…read morecome for an estimate - smallish job to begin, much larger project later in the year. Measurements were taken and promise of a proposal the following week made. Nothing came. We waited another week +, and then called, left a message to check in including request to let us know if she wasn't interested in the job. No response. It is totally fine not to want to take on a project but not having the professionalism to say so rather than passively stringing customers along is just bad business.

Have worked on 3 properties with Morami Studio. Amazing attention to detail and focus on each…read moreproject. Extensive native plant knowledge and beautiful aesthetic.

Morami did a great job on my garden. They are professional and elegant. Would highly recommend.read more

We hired this firm to create plans for an outdoor space, but, unfortunately, they did not keep our…read morestated budget in mind and designed plans that were unusable. This cost us $17K, which was basically wasted.

I highly respect Bill Mellett and his tree experts such as Carlos Garcia, who are honest and…read moretrustworthy with their opinions and cost. I highly recommend this arborist and Carlos over others who have given hugely different expensive quotes compared to them. I wouldn't trust anyone else in Ojai. Bless those who are honest!

DO NOT ENGAGE...I had a nightmare experience with this man. I hired him to make a plan for our…read moregardens. He charged $500.00/hour, ($350.00 for him and $150.00 per hour for his drafts person), to provide a map of my existing layout and filled in the page with photos of other gardens with the directions of..."Put these here". I set up another meeting for him to explain how many plants and in what patterns they should be, he admonished me by saying it was not rocket science. he cancelled the first meeting 20 minutes before the meeting time. I should also mention that said plans were not enlargeable on the computer in the format it was sent, and then charged $11.00 to make (2) copies on top of a $3,700 fee. When I reviewed his copies of said plans with him, it became obvious that he could not read these plans! Beware. O, and if you decide to override this warning, be prepared that no one ever answers the phone and the mailbox is always full. In hindsight, it all adds up...

YOU'LL BE TAKEN TO THE CLEANERS! We scheduled an…read moreappointment thru Paul's assistant for a landscape design consultation. We were warned that he would charge for this service and it would take an hour or so and he would bring his drafts-person to take measurements of the yard. The fee was supposed to be $370. We figured that since a couple of our neighbors had used him that we may end up doing the same, so weren't worried about the consultation fee. Paul showed up and spent 1-1/2 hours discussing some design ideas. He also brought his daughter who was not introduced as another designer but spent her time taking measurements. When he left he said he'd have a rough bid for the design in a couple weeks. HOWEVER....3 days later we received an invoice for $1200!! That's not a joke! No design concepts, no details, no anything! Assuming this was for design work. we immediately called and told him to stop designing because we were still interviewing landscape designers. He said "oh the $1200 is just for the 1-1/2 hour consultation". He revealed that he actually brought his daughter, who was a designer and the two of them charge $300 EACH PER HOUR!!!!!! What a bunch of crap. He spent almost half his time chit chatting, and also brought his dog into the yard (without even asking us) and he proceeded to destroy all my dog's toys. No apology and no offer to replace them either! His service wasn't worth a dime! Go elsewhere. There are many great landscape designers out there who are way more talented than this guy, who won't screw you with bogus fees.

Luke and his team did a fantastic job in our yard. We wanted to remove some trees and add some…read moreprivacy trees. I had an idea of what I wanted, but Luke helped me adjust my idea to make it better. He is very knowledgeable about what he does and is just a nice guy. He came with a good size crew and they went to work to make sure the trees were placed exactly right. They also installed a drip system to make the trees live their best life, and helped show us how to use it. The team cleaned up so well that our yard looks better than it did before they arrived. I would strongly recommend this company to anyone looking for landscape work.

Luke and his crew did an amazing job. His pricing was very reasonable and when they left for the…read moreday everything was clean. We couldn't believe he got the project done in 2 days! We were very impressed and would highly recommend them for your landscaping needs.

I met David by chance in late 2016 and hired him to help us map out a complete remodel of our…read morehistoric home that needed a complete overhaul. David was really patient with us as we didn't have the biggest budget and helped us with not only a well laid out floor plan for our changing needs (it was very funky before) but also helped with our project management which I found incredibly helpful. Most important, we didn't have to hire a separate designer. He suggested very thoughtful period centric elements to build in and materials, tiles, and color schemes to ensure our home had the right feel. He introduced me to some really beautiful and unique materials I'd have never found. In the end we finished everything (including the landscaping) in 2019 before the pandemic to enjoy full time home living. My last comment is that David also works fairly quickly. Our street is older had many architects remodeling our neighbors and it seemed we had the fastest process with getting our plans completed. Highly recommend David.

Attempting any new project whether a home remodel or commercial build-out is overwhelming for…read moreanyone but hiring the right architect with experience and approach can make all the difference. That's why I hired David Watkins Design, to help guide me through the process. David has a proven track record that you can see in his well organized attention to detail, while making sure he communicates through every step of the way. His good relations and many years of working with The City of Santa Barbara has made what could be a frustrating and overwhelming task for the average person, a breeze. David always makes himself available to discuss and update me on my project. I would recommend David Watkins Design to anyone who wants to get the job done right, while having a personalized experience throughout the process.