Well Rooted Landscape — Landscape design, build & care in Southeast LA & Orange County

What we do

Everything from the first sketch to the Thursday mow.

Take the whole yard or one piece of it. Most clients start with a project, then keep us on for upkeep.

Garden design & planting

A planting plan drawn for your light, soil, and how you actually use the yard — then planted by the same people who drew it.

Front yard refreshes
Backyard redesigns
Raised beds and edibles

Turf management

A season-by-season program for the grass itself. Feeding, weed and pest control, aeration, and mowing at the right height so the lawn crowds out what you don't want.

Fertilizing on a schedule
Weed and pest control
Aeration and dethatching
Overseeding and thin-spot repair

Irrigation & drip

Leak hunting, valve repair, and converting thirsty spray heads to drip. We tune controllers by season so you stop paying to water the sidewalk.

Repairs and rezoning
Drip conversions
Smart controller setup

Hardscape & masonry

Pavers, walkways, patios, retaining walls, and dry creek beds. Built on a proper base so the joints stay tight and water goes where you want it.

Paver patios and paths
Decomposed granite and stepping stones
Block and stone walls
Drainage and grading

Tree & shrub care

Structural pruning that keeps a tree's shape instead of topping it, plus shaping, thinning, stump grinding, and removals when it's time.

Pruning and thinning
Removals and stumps
Storm cleanup

Lawn alternatives

Swap thirsty grass for something that holds up in a dry August — low-water planting, decomposed granite, or artificial turf. We handle removal, soil prep, and rebate paperwork.

Turf removal
Native and low-water planting
Artificial turf
Rebate documentation

How it works

Four steps, and you know the price before anyone digs.

Day one

Walk the yard

We meet you on site, look at sun, soil, and drainage, and listen to what you want the space to do.

Within 3 days

Plan and price

You get a written estimate with the plant list, materials, and a start date. Line by line, no lump sums.

Build week

Build it

One crew, one lead, daily cleanup. You get a photo update at the end of each day we're on site.

Ongoing

Keep it thriving

We come back to tune irrigation and prune through the first year, or stay on for regular maintenance.

Why it matters here

Built for a dry Southern California.

Roughly half of what a Los Angeles household uses goes outside, and most of that lands on lawn. A garden built for this climate cuts the bill, survives the restrictions, and looks alive in September when the turf next door has gone tan.

~50% of the average LA home's water is used outdoors

Local water districts often pay per square foot to replace turf. We'll tell you at the walkthrough whether your address qualifies and handle the before-and-after photos.

Plants we reach for

Cleveland sageSalvia clevelandii

ToyonHeteromeles arbutifolia

DeergrassMuhlenbergia rigens

ManzanitaArctostaphylos

CeanothusCeanothus spp.

Coast live oakQuercus agrifolia

AgaveAgave attenuata

WestringiaWestringia fruticosa

YarrowAchillea millefolium

Every plan is written for your yard, so this is a starting palette, not a catalog. If you want fruit trees, roses, or a patch of real grass for the kids, we'll make room for it and water it properly.

Recent work

Same yard, before and after.

Every pair below is shot from the same spot, so you can see what actually changed instead of a staged photo of somebody else's house.

Front yard

Turf removal · grading · irrigation · sod

The same front yard with a full green lawn laid to the edge of the curved concrete walkway — Sod laid tight to the walkway and the brick planter, with no gaps at the seams.

The finished lawn with four pop-up sprinkler heads running, spraying even arcs of water

The part you don't see

Water has to reach every corner, or the lawn tells on you.

New sod dies in patches when the heads don't overlap. We set and test the pop-ups before the first roll goes down, then run the zones while we're still on site so dry spots show up while we can still fix them.

After that it's a watering schedule you can follow: heavy for the first two weeks while the roots take, then backed off week by week until the lawn is on its own.

Side yard

Dead turf removal · decomposed granite · concrete stepping stones

A strip of lawn along the house that never got enough water and never really grew. It came out, and the whole run became decomposed granite with poured stepping stones down the middle — no mowing, no sprinklers, and a path you can walk to the back gate in the rain.

Narrow side yard with dry brown patchy grass running between the house and a block wall toward a back gate — Looking toward the back gate. Brown, uneven, and half dirt by the end of summer.

The same side yard filled with grey decomposed granite running the length of the wall to the gate — Same view. Decomposed granite edge to edge, graded so water drains away from the house.

Dead brown lawn beside a concrete patio slab at the back corner of the house — The patio end, where the turf gave up first.

The same corner with rectangular concrete stepping stones set in staggered rows across decomposed granite — Stepping stones set in staggered rows, spaced to an easy stride and levelled to each other.

Front yard, tree out

Tree removal · turf removal · artificial turf

A conifer that had outgrown the lot was shading most of the yard and dropping needles on everything under it. Nothing would grow. It came down in sections, the dead lawn came out, and the whole front went to artificial turf. The house was repainted in between, which is why the color changes — same address, same arched window.

Front yard of bare brown dirt and dead grass, with a large conifer filling the right side of the lot — Dry, thin, and mostly bare under the canopy.

The same front yard with artificial turf covering the whole lawn area and the conifer gone, opening the yard to sunlight — Same corner, tree gone. Turf laid to the walkway, the planter wall, and the drive.

A tall conifer standing beside the single-storey house, roughly three times the height of the roofline — Taller than the house by a good margin, and close enough to the wall to matter.

A climber roped in near the top of the stripped trunk, cutting it down while foliage lies piled below — Taken down in sections from the top, roped and cut so nothing drops on the house, the fence, or the cars.

The finished front of the house from the street, with artificial turf running from the driveway to the walkway in full sun — Full sun on the yard for the first time in years, and nothing to mow or water.

Lawn to garden

Turf removal · planting plan · mulch · stepping stones

A thin, weedy lawn that cost water all summer and still looked tired. It came out for a planted bed — agave, aloe, cordyline, lavender and salvia set in bark mulch, with a curved edge and stepping stones running from the porch to the drive. It gets watered by drip now, not sprinklers.

Front yard of thin patchy grass and bare dirt running flat from the porch to the street — Flat, thin, and more weed than grass by the end of the season.

The same yard replaced by a curved mulch bed planted with agaves, aloe, cordyline and lavender, with stepping stones leading to the driveway — Same view. A curved bed, mulched deep, with the plants spaced for the size they'll actually reach.

Weed barrier fabric down across the yard with plants still in their nursery pots, set out in position with bender board marking the curve

Before anything goes in the ground

We set the whole yard out in pots first.

Fabric down, edging bent to the curve, then every plant placed while it's still in its nursery pot. It takes an extra hour and it's the cheapest hour on the job — moving an agave is free at that stage and a real chore once it's planted.

It's also when spacing gets decided. Most front yards are planted too tight because everything looks small at the nursery. Set out in position, you can see the gaps that will close in two years and leave them alone.

View from the front porch across the brick landing and stepping stone path to the planted beds and the street beyond — From the porch. The path lands on the brick, and the beds read as one shape from the door.

We photograph jobs as we finish them, so this list grows. Ask at the walkthrough and we'll show you work near you.

Where we work

Southeast LA and into Orange County.

We keep our routes tight so crews arrive on time and you're never waiting a week for a callback. If you're just outside the list, ask anyway — we cross the county line most weeks.

Los Angeles County

South Gate Downey Lynwood Huntington Park Bell Bell Gardens Cudahy Paramount Maywood Compton Norwalk Whittier Bellflower Lakewood Long Beach

Orange County

La Habra Brea Fullerton Buena Park La Palma Cypress Anaheim Stanton Garden Grove Los Alamitos Seal Beach Westminster Orange Santa Ana

Free estimate

Tell us about the yard.

Send a few details and we'll call to set up a walkthrough, usually the same day. Photos help, so bring them along when we talk.

A yard that gets better every year.