Mariposa Gardening & Design

«We retained Mariposa for a $ 19,044 drainage & landscaping project in 2014. While we were not satisfied with the outcome, we reached final settlements with Mariposa’s insurance carriers. The terms of those settlements are confidential.»

We hired Mariposa to take on landscaping for our whole property. We had purchased a house and were in the process of completely gutting and rebuilding it. We decided to do the same with all of the landscaping.
We had some general preferences on plant selection but needed someone who could really come up with a creative vision for the site. Andrea’s knowledge and skill were apparent the first time we reviewed the designs she came up with.
The actual work included sheet mulching, all the planting, a new irrigation system for front and back, a permeable paver driveway, stone paths, a couple of stone landings, a fire pit with a beautiful stacked stone bench, and stone orb Andrea crafted from leftovers on site. The quality of work was excellent and the crew was efficient and professional. In the end we really couldn’t be happier with how things turned out.

Andrea does beautiful work, but she is very difficult to work with. Her team is great, but she didn’t communicate well with us when we had questions/​concerns, and I have since heard that this is a common complaint. Our garden does look great, but I don’t think that I’d work with her again.

As an aspiring home-​gardener, permaculture-​minded thinker and new Bay Area resident I recently had the pleasure of taking a tour of some of Mariposa Gardening’s work. Andrea’s artistry, as well as her use of native and sustainable plants, trees and stone is beautiful and inspiring! Awesome incorporation of habitat gardens, rainwater catchment ponds and overall landscape design with a natural, inviting feel.

My wife and I too have had a VERY UNSATISFACTORY experience with Mariposa Gardening and Design and its owner and principal designer, Andrea Hurd.
The problems started literally on the first day of installation. We had negotiated a detailed contract and on the first day she informed us that the flagstone she had showed us for the hardscape and we wanted for the garden was more significantly expensive that what she had quoted in the contract. Why Andrea didn’t tell us upfront while we were negotiating the contract is beyond me.
Second, Andrea really took the fun out of the garden planning. She really was not willing to include us in the plant selection process or even spend a day at the nursery with us. She basically gave us books to look at, without even showing us which items she was recommending. This really took the fun out of the project for us, though I suspect if you’re one who doesn’t want to be involved at all, then this shouldn’t matter to you.
Third, in the middle of the install, Andrea tells us that she is taking a two week vacation, which she didn’t tell us about initially! We were accommodating, but upon her return she had already booked other jobs so she never was able to come and finish our garden in the time frame we expected. The completion dragged on for many months past the original date promised and to this day it’s still not complete.
Andrea specializes in stonework, though the stone wall she built has lost several stones and is now totally unsafe for our kids — it’s only been a year. The fountain she installed has also never worked properly. We’ve asked her many times to come back and fix the stone fence and the fountain and she has refused unless we pay her additional hourly rates — after we already spent more than $ 35,000!
During the install Andrea had many times promised to give us proposals to provide maintenance, install additional lighting, etc., and she never followed through. She also never completed the installation of a stone walkway and while a garden is always a work in process, we’re finding ourselves replacing many of the plants she chose.
Andrea is entirely unprofessional and unpleasant to work with. Based on our experience, my wife and I would not recommend her.
Signed D&D, very unhappy Berkeley customers.