I Hired Three People Before I Found the Right Landscape Architect for Sunset Cliffs

by SpotlightPublicist | Jun 10, 2026 | Landscape, Uncategorized

A few years ago, I bought a place in Sunset Cliffs for the same reason most people buy a place in Sunset Cliffs: I saw the view and completely lost my ability to make rational financial decisions.

The house overlooked the ocean from what felt like every possible angle. The sunsets looked so absurdly beautiful that they seemed computer-generated, and I convinced myself that everything else could be figured out later.

As it turned out, “everything else” included a backyard that appeared to have been maintained according to a highly sophisticated strategy known as “ignore it and hope for the best.”

There was patchy ice plant scattered across the property, cracked hardscape running in random directions, drainage that sent water toward the house instead of away from it, and several plants that were either dead or had somehow evolved beyond my understanding.

I figured fixing it would be simple. Throw in some attractive plants, lay down a little stone, hire somebody who knew what they were doing, and turn the place into something that looked like the courtyard of a luxury resort.

I was smart. I had money. I had absolutely no idea what I was about to learn about coastal landscaping.

My First Mistake

The first guy came recommended by a neighbor.

“He does landscaping,” the neighbor told me, which sounded convincing enough at the time.

The man showed up, walked the property, nodded thoughtfully, and confidently explained what needed to happen. A few weeks later, fresh plants were installed, decorative boulders appeared, and new pavers tied everything together.

For about two months, I was thrilled.

Then the problems started.

The bougainvillea along the fence line got shredded by salt spray. Ornamental grasses turned brown and crispy. Succulents that were supposedly impossible to kill somehow managed to rot because water kept pooling near the foundation every time it rained.

When I asked what happened, the solution was simply to replace the dead plants with different plants.

What nobody addressed was the fact that the original selections weren’t designed for a coastal bluff environment in the first place. They were the kind of plants that work perfectly well inland, where salt air, constant wind exposure, and coastal soil conditions aren’t trying to murder them every day.

There was no discussion about drainage. No discussion about salt-tolerant species. No discussion about site conditions.

I paid the bill, thanked him for his efforts, and started searching for someone else.

My Second Mistake

This time I hired a real landscaping company.

They had trucks. They had crews. They had a website filled with beautiful photographs of completed projects. Everything felt much more professional.

They developed a design that looked fantastic on paper. There were new planting areas, expanded hardscape, a patio extension, and a fire feature that immediately had me imagining sunset cocktails with friends.

The finished product genuinely looked great.

For about six months.

Then the pavers on one slope started shifting. The drainage system handled small storms reasonably well, but the first substantial rainfall exposed weaknesses that surface grading alone couldn’t solve.

A retaining wall on the lower portion of the property began showing cracks. Nothing catastrophic, but enough to tell me something wasn’t right.

What I eventually learned was that the company had done perfectly respectable landscaping work. The problem was that Sunset Cliffs isn’t a perfectly respectable landscaping environment.

Between the salt exposure, wind loads, erosion concerns, bluff conditions, and regulatory considerations that can accompany coastal properties, the site demanded a deeper level of analysis than a standard landscaping project.

Once again, I found myself paying for work that looked right but wasn’t built specifically for where it was built.

The Difference Was Obvious Immediately

By the time I started looking for hire number three, I had become significantly less optimistic and significantly more expensive to impress.

This time, I searched specifically for a landscape architect.

The difference became obvious during the first meeting.

The handyman had started planting. The landscaper had started designing. The architect started asking questions.

Lots of questions.

They wanted soil information. They wanted drainage information. They wanted to understand wind patterns, salt exposure, slope conditions, and how water moved across the property during heavy storms.

They reviewed potential regulatory considerations associated with coastal-zone properties and examined how future improvements could affect both aesthetics and long-term performance.

Only after all of that did they begin discussing design.

The resulting plan reflected the site itself rather than some generic template. Salt-tolerant native and Mediterranean plants were selected specifically for the property’s microclimate. Drainage systems were engineered to handle actual coastal storm conditions. Hardscape materials were chosen with long-term salt exposure in mind.

Even the retaining solution was designed around the specific soil conditions present on the slope.

This was the first time I encountered landscape construction San Diego homeowners with coastal properties actually need. Everything was tailored to the location instead of being adapted from an inland design philosophy.

The firm behind the project was Torrey Pines Landscape Company, and for the first time since buying the house, I felt like someone was solving the actual problem instead of addressing symptoms.

The project took longer than either of the previous attempts.

It also cost less than the first two attempts combined because nothing had to be redone afterward.

What Sunset Cliffs Taught Me

The experience taught me something I probably should have understood from the beginning.

Landscaping a coastal property isn’t necessarily harder than landscaping anywhere else. It’s simply a different discipline.

The handyman wasn’t incompetent. The landscaping company wasn’t incompetent either.

They just didn’t know what they didn’t know.

The architect approached the site differently from the beginning. Soil, drainage, wind, salt exposure, slope stability, and regulatory constraints were all evaluated before a single plant went into the ground.

That upfront work was what the first two attempts skipped.

It was also what made the third attempt successful.

Sunset Cliffs may be one of the most beautiful places in San Diego to own property, but it doesn’t forgive shortcuts. Looking back, this is one area where my usual strategy of figuring things out as I went along cost me considerably more than doing things correctly the first time.

Expensive Practice

Today the backyard finally looks like it belongs to the house, and the house finally looks like it belongs to the cliff.

I’m not going to pretend I enjoyed paying three times for essentially the same project, but the lesson turned out to be valuable. When a site is complicated, the person you hire needs to understand the site before they start working on it.

Everything else is just expensive practice.

Torrey Pines Landscape Company

+18584541433

5560 Eastgate Mall, San Diego, CA 92121