Drainage and bioswales, rainwater harvesting, native and Gulf-coast design, fountains, organic pest control. Built for gumbo clay and bayou-country flooding — not a one-size catalog. The on-site read is $300, credited â free when you build.
Drainage-first · bayou countryHarris CountyFree Site Read
Houston is the flattest, wettest, worst-draining ground in Texas — and that's not an insult, it's the design problem. Under most of the city is gumbo: expansive Vertisol clay that swells when it's wet and cracks when it's dry, ten to thirty feet deep with no sand or gravel beneath to take the water. Once that clay saturates, it turns nearly waterproof. Every drop after that runs off — to the street, to the bayou, into the house.
That's why Houston floods. The bayous — Buffalo, Brays, White Oak, Greens — carry the runoff, and in a real storm they can't carry it fast enough. Harris County is spending billions to widen them. But the first fix is on the lot: slow the water down before it ever reaches the channel.
We read your ground before we build on it. On gumbo clay in bayou country, that's not a nicety — it's the whole job.
The call, in the flood capital. Storm pooling on gumbo, sheet flow with nowhere to go, water graded at the slab. We build the lot to hold and infiltrate the smaller storms instead of shipping it all to the bayou.
Catch the storm instead of fighting it — every gallon in a cistern is a gallon that didn't sheet off the gumbo. Houston Public Works runs a rain-barrel program to help.
Under Houston's watering rules, thirsty lawn is a liability. Native and Gulf-coast design cuts water and stops drowning roots in clay that won't drain.
Mosquito and fire ant, no synthetics — and on the Gulf coast, mosquito is a year-round war. Treat the standing water and the imbalance, not just spray the symptom.
Food and habitat that fit the lot — raised over the clay where they have to be, from a Heights bungalow yard to a Memorial acre.
§ 2 · The local reality
Gumbo, flat ground, and the bayou.
Most of the landscaping failures we get called to fix around Houston come from ignoring the ground. Sod laid over gumbo that drowns its own roots. A French drain dropped on dead-flat clay with nowhere to daylight. A bed graded toward the foundation on soil that already moves the slab. Runoff shoved straight to a street that's already at capacity in a hard rain.
The fixes aren't exotic — they're just specific. Break and amend the clay so roots can breathe. Hold the smaller storms in a planted bioswale or rain garden that infiltrates slowly instead of dumping fast. Raise the beds that need raising. Pull water off the foundation and send it where it can soak in. Done right, a Houston landscape floods less, drowns fewer plants, and keeps more of its own rain — which is the only flood control that starts at your property line.
§ 3 · Rebates & water rules
Let the city chip in.
Houston runs seasonal watering rules, and Houston Public Works offers water-conservation help: a Rain Barrel Program (discounted 50-gallon barrels a couple of times a year), incentives for smart weather-based irrigation controllers and drip-irrigation conversions, and high-efficiency fixture rebates. Where a project can use them, we design it to — and we'll point you to the programs that are live at houstonpublicworks.org. We never quote a rebate number we can't source.
Yes — and in Houston it's the call. The ground is the problem: expansive gumbo clay that, once saturated, takes almost no more water, on terrain flat enough that runoff has nowhere to go but the bayou and the street. We read the actual flow path on the property, then build the right fix — a planted bioswale and rain garden to hold and infiltrate the smaller storms, a regrade to pull water off the foundation, detention where the lot can take it. We can't widen a bayou, but we can keep your lot's water on your lot longer, which is where flood damage actually starts.
What grows in Houston's gumbo clay?
More than people think — once you stop fighting the clay. Houston's Vertisol clay is brutal on the wrong plants and on foundations, but plenty of tough natives and Gulf-coast species thrive in it: live oak, bald cypress (it loves wet feet), Texas sage, Turk's cap, inland sea oats, native sedges and rushes for the low spots, American beautyberry. We break and amend the clay at planting and choose the palette that already knows this heat and this water.
Are there rebates for water-wise landscaping in Houston?
Yes — through Houston Public Works. There's a Rain Barrel Program (discounted 50-gallon barrels offered a couple of times a year), incentives for smart weather-based irrigation controllers and drip-irrigation conversions, and high-efficiency fixture rebates. We design projects to use them where they fit and point you to the current programs at houstonpublicworks.org. We never quote a rebate figure we can't source.
Do you offer a free estimate in Houston?
The first Site Read is $300, credited — free when you build — a 60-to-90-minute on-site reading of your property (soil, water, sun, drainage, canopy) plus a written summary within 48 hours. It's the honest version of an estimate: you get a real plan and a price range, whether or not you build with us.
Logged on site
From first look to built
Three steps. No leap of faith.
Start free. See your property in 3D before you spend a dollar on the build. Then build it for a number you can see coming.
01 · Free
Preliminary Read.
We come read your property — soil, water, light, the lay of the land — and sketch a direction. Credited in full, no obligation.
02 · $300, credited in full
3D LiDAR Design.
A drone-LiDAR scan and a measured 3D design — exactly where the water flows, drawn to the inch. The $300 comes off your build.
03 · Priced clear
We build it.
Curbside bioswales from $300 a linear meter, plus fountains, native landscapes, and water systems — built by the same hands. No surprise numbers.