Update: We are still happy with Craig's installation and his irrigation service which we have had to use in the year since we had our front beds installed.
A word of caution to novices like ourselves about landscape design and plant choices. Do your homework on the maturity size of all of the plants you intend to install, as well as your sunlight conditions at and around your house. Many of the Texas native and more hardier varieties of shrubs Craig chose have not fared well due to decreasing amount of sunlight year after year as other plants in the garden compete for the same light. Every time I show pictures of issues I'm having at gardening centers, I'm told that certain varieties should be getting way more sun than they are, or they're too densely packed in a certain location on the bed. We did tell Craig that we wanted a really full and lush look and gave us what we wanted, but now it's to our detriment.
We've had to make a few replacements and adjustments ourselves due to this problem, and another oversight of ours and Craig's: not paying attention to our neighbor's yard whose trees cast quite a bit of shade into our yard about halfway through the day. When our landscaping was installed it was winter time and these trees are humongous but they had no leaves at that time. Also the sun's position is different in the winter. It was only the next summer that we realized quite how much shade they really do cast on one side of our yard making it very difficult for sun-loving shrub varieties to thrive, and eliminating any symmetry we were going for between both sides of the house. One side has consistently grown well, this side struggles and everything is smaller.
We've had to pull and replace several shrubs over the years due to frost damage, lack of sufficient sunlight, and in the case of several abelias: poor health. We were aiming for little to no maintenance, just pruning, mulching, and fertilizing, and we certainly got more than we signed up for. It's not been an issue for us, we both enjoy gardening quite a bit now, and we have learned a lot along the way. I just regret not being more savvy then and relying solely on Craig's design which was fine for initial install but both aesthetically and fundamentally did not make sense once these plants started growing.
(2021)
So far so good! From the get-to, Craig was responsive and easy to work with. He designed a really beautiful front landscape for us composed of drought-tolerant, easy to maintain, hands-off, and "hard to screw up" plants (at our specific request because we suck at gardening) that will hopefully bring us joy for years to come. There's nothing quite like a refreshed landscape and if you can afford to do it, I highly recommend working with Craig. His prices are fair and his advice is really handy - especially for novice garden people like ourselves. He's still been responsive and helpful, months after planting our beds. Every time I have a stupid gardening question or concern, he responds with advice and insights and doesn't make me feel like the novice I am!