Gardening Essentials and More from a Professional Landscaper

If you ever wondered what a professional landscaper plants in her garden, then you’ll be interested in reading about Hilde Simon, a Marin County horticulturist. She has a ‚”14-year-old business being a landscape contractor/garden designer” and on her own property, she plants Toyon, Quince, a Meyer lemon, Michelia and Star Jasmine, to name only a few.

Hilde’s front yard is ‚”fenced and gated,” keeping in a mix of exotic and native plants. She grows a fragrant Sarcococca plant at the entrance of her garden to welcome her guests as well as her family when they come home. She is a devoted wife and mother of three grown children. Though she is passionate about her work, she successfully manages to balance her personal life with her professional duties.

‚”I’m the boss,” she says of her business. Being the owner allows her to manage her time in a way that ensures all of her responsibilities are met. Although she doesn’t have employees, she contracts out and coordinates labor. Her focus and specialty is in the design and implementation of a garden or landscape but not on maintenance.

Business from the Past to the Present

All of Hilde’s clients have come to her by a referral or verbal recommendation. In fact, she started out in this field of work ‚”on a dare from a neighbor.” Hilde knew the designer that had made a bid but believed she would be a better fit for the job at hand. Her neighbor asked her to submit a bid of her own and she was chosen to do the landscaping.

Since the time of her humble beginnings, Hilde evolved into an accomplished professional. She has worked on over 100 properties and has won the Marin Municipal Water District garden design award in 1995, 1999 and 2002. Her qualifications also include attendance in courses on environmental landscaping (eight classes in total) as well as drafting and architecture at the College of Marin.

Her current work emphasizes sustainability and appropriateness in a western garden. Fifty percent of a natural space should incorporate native plants. To explain her conviction, she equates native plants, such as Amanzantias, to Native Americans. Hilde is appalled with the ‚”spend to impress” mentality that envisions a property as beautiful with imported plants that ruin the habitat of indigenous plants, animals and insects.

She notes that she is not ‚”rigid and moralistic about [her] own opinions in other people’s space.” If a client wants to keep Hydrandgeas on their property, she recommends growing them in a pot rather than putting ‚”six in the ground” because of their high water consumption. She also advises against big lawns, which emerged as a landscape in Great Britain due to the frequent rainfall and the domestication of livestock that grazed upon the land. A lawn is incongruous with the ecology in California, but if a client wants one on their property, Hilde will think of a way to incorporate it into an ‚”environmentally sound” landscape.

Don’t Waste Space

To plan for a large space, Hilde uses the three primary colors (red, yellow and blue) to create a balance in the garden, but for a small space, only two colors, such as green and white or red and blue, are needed to create harmony within the property. For a space in front of the house and facing the street, Hilde recommends hedges to be placed towards the back for a more inviting look. Above all else, Hilde advises on using ‚”a note of common sense” when designing a garden. A mistake that novice landscapers often make is overplanting. ‚”They don’t plan for the plant’s eventual growth,” she explains. She, herself has planted a 30-foot Field Oak Tree from just an acorn.

Hilde’s advice to gardeners and landscapers is to ‚”keep it simple, strive for balance and keep the big picture in mind.” Her own interest in gardening developed because she enjoys transforming a space through horticulture. She has a good eye for design and she is gifted in visual presentation. ‚”Gardening has taught me humility, nothing stays the same,” she says and compares this profession with her other profession of being a mother. She sees obvious similarities in the growth of plants with the growth of children.

Problems and Solutions

Hilde has experienced various challenges in her work. Some of Hilde’s challenges include organizing and ‚”obtaining the plants that I specify.” She has also been stopped at an airport for having fertilizer on her shoe. She doesn’t consider a tricky site as a challenge, however. It’s more of an opportunity to grow and learn. For example, she has had to circumvent obstacles, such as shady hills frequented by deer that eat any growth that might be able to flourish in spite of the lack of sunlight.

Hilde overcame these and other problems through creativity, patience and people skills. She has collaborated with other landscapers, gardeners, contractors and home builders. She has also worked with real estate agents to stage a house that is new to the market. She has a talent for this kind of work because she puts herself in the mindset of the perspective buyer; however, her passion is with sustainable, native landscapes.

For example, she sent a mailer to her clients and placed an advertisement in a local paper to plant California Pipevines. This plant is important for the San Francisco Bay area ecology because it sustains the Swallowtail butterfly population that thrives on Angel Island. She received 20 acceptances and plans to follow up with her clients to check on the development of the plant.

Hilde has worked on gardens in Tiburon, Ross and the surrounding area. She currently works with a local homeowner on developing her property, and in June of 2011 she will work with a condominium developer to design the property’s landscape. Though she keeps herself busy, Hilde is accepting new clients and she can be reached on her home phone, (415) 435-1012.