Reading the grade
Nine feet of fall across forty looks flat in a photograph. It decides where water goes, what has to be retained, and whether a terrace costs two thousand dollars or twenty.
Home/Why Not an App
An honest comparison
There are apps that will design your yard for $297.
They're genuinely useful for some people. Here's exactly what they do, what we do, and how to tell which one your property needs — so you can decide without a sales conversation.
The short answer
- Flat lot, no HOA, doing it yourself — use the app
- Grade, drainage or a board to satisfy — use a designer
- Spending $40,000+ on the build — use a designer
| Online design service | Quartier's Designs | Design–build firm | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Typical cost | $297 – $3,495 | From $2,400 | Design often folded into the build |
| Turnaround | 1–2 weeks | Scheduled in your proposal | Varies |
| Visits your property | No — works from photographs | Yes, always, before drawing | Yes |
| Grading & drainage plan | No | Included where the site needs it | Usually |
| HOA submittal package | No | Yes — drawn to your board's requirements | Sometimes |
| Knows your soil, grade, covenants | No | Yes — we walked it | Yes |
| Sells you the installation | No | No — by design | Yes — that's the model |
| Margin on specified materials | None | None | Yes |
| Collects bids on your behalf | No | Two or three trusted builders | No — they are the builder |
| Returns once construction starts | No | Yes | Yes |
The gap
Four things that can't be done from photographs.
Not because the software is bad — it's often very good — but because these four require someone standing on your ground.
Digging the soil
Expansive clay behaves nothing like the loam a plant database assumes. What survives here, and how deep a footing needs to sit, is something you learn with a spade.
Your HOA's actual covenants
Every Douglas County board has its own rules and its own temperament — sheet sizes, plant lists, what they've rejected before. A national service has no way to know any of it.
Where the sun lands in August
A west-facing slope in The Meadows bakes its planting by late summer. The same design on the north side of the same street works perfectly. Only exposure tells you which you have.
Drawings a builder can bid
A render is a picture. A contractor needs dimensions, elevations, materials and quantities — otherwise every bid you get back is priced on a different assumption.
Being here afterward
When the crew hits something unexpected three weeks in, someone has to answer the phone and adjust the drawing. That is not a service an app offers.
Choose the app if
Your lot is flat and simple. You have no HOA, or a permissive one. You intend to do the planting yourself. You want ideas more than drawings, and you're comfortable adapting them as you go. For a straightforward suburban back yard, $297 is well spent — and we'll tell you so.
Choose us if
Your property has grade, drainage, or wind to solve. Your HOA has rejected something before. You're hiring a contractor and need drawings precise enough to bid against and build from. You're spending $40,000 or more on the construction and want the plan to be right before anyone digs.
A rendering made from photographs cannot tell you that a west-facing slope in The Meadows will cook its planting by August. Standing on it can.
Jean-Michel Quartier · Angers, France → Castle Rock, Colorado
Questions
Fair questions about the difference.
It is — and it's the wrong comparison. The design is a small fraction of what you'll spend. On a $60,000 build, the difference between the two is under four percent of the total, and it's the four percent that decides whether the other ninety-six is spent well.
Yes, and people do. Bring whatever you've generated — it's a useful way to show us what you're drawn to. We'll tell you honestly which parts will work on your ground and which won't.
We'll build it in three dimensions as a standalone service, whether we drew it or not. Useful if you want to see it before committing, or need something persuasive for an HOA board.
The expensive failures are almost always drainage and grade — water directed at a foundation, a retaining wall that wasn't allowed for, a patio that has to be relaid. None of those are visible in a photograph, so none of them are anyone's fault. They're just invisible from a thousand miles away.
Begin
Book a free consultation
We'll tell you honestly if your project doesn't need us. That's happened before and nobody minded.