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Verge & ValeLandscapes 0400 000 000

Landscape design and construction, Brisbane west

Gardens built for the slope they sit on

Retaining walls, drainage, turf, paving and planting from Kenmore out to Pullenvale. We take levels and draw the plan before anyone quotes a wall or orders a pallet of turf.

Call 0400 000 000 Book a site visit
  • QBCC Licence 0000000
  • Fixed written quote
  • Design and build, one crew
Rectangular stone stepping pavers laid across a lawn beside a rendered raised planter, with palms behind.
Stepping pavers. Stone pavers set across the lawn beside a rendered planter at seat height. The turf runs right up to every edge, so the mower goes straight over.

The garden year

What a Brisbane garden wants, month by month

Subtropical Brisbane gives you work worth doing in all twelve months. What moves is which job belongs in which month.

  • Turf at its best
  • Planting at its best
  • Walls, paving, irrigation
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec

Opened on this month, from your device's date. Tap any month to read it.

January, this month

Wet season, December to February

Hot, humid and stormy. Turf strikes fast on the back of real rain but wants watching for fungal patch, and dense new planting is better held a few weeks.

Best this month

Every job is workable this month, none is at its best.

Turf still goes down. Summer works with proper watering and an eye out for fungal patches after storms.

Worth a look this month: which beds cop the western sun, and which never see it.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

February, this month

Wet season, December to February

Hot, humid and stormy. Turf strikes fast on the back of real rain but wants watching for fungal patch, and dense new planting is better held a few weeks.

Best this month

Every job is workable this month, none is at its best.

Turf still goes down. Summer works with proper watering and an eye out for fungal patches after storms.

A February storm moves a lot of water in a hurry. Drains run to a lawful point of discharge, never over the neighbour's fence.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

March, this month

Turning season, March to May

The rain eases while the soil is still warm. The best planting window of the year for natives, and turf laid now establishes on far less water.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. The best window of the year for natives.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

April, this month

Turning season, March to May

The rain eases while the soil is still warm. The best planting window of the year for natives, and turf laid now establishes on far less water.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. The best window of the year for natives.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

May, this month

Turning season, March to May

The rain eases while the soil is still warm. The best planting window of the year for natives, and turf laid now establishes on far less water.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. The best window of the year for natives.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

June, this month

Dry season, June to August

The driest, coolest stretch, and the window we book walls, paving and irrigation into, with the least rain to work around.

Best this month

  • Walls, paving and irrigation. The least rain to work around.

Turf still goes down. Winter laying is fine, it just takes longer to knit in before it can take normal foot traffic.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

July, this month

Dry season, June to August

The driest, coolest stretch, and the window we book walls, paving and irrigation into, with the least rain to work around.

Best this month

  • Walls, paving and irrigation. The least rain to work around.

Turf still goes down. Winter laying is fine, it just takes longer to knit in before it can take normal foot traffic.

Mulched beds hold their moisture through a dry July.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

August, this month

Dry season, June to August

The driest, coolest stretch, and the window we book walls, paving and irrigation into, with the least rain to work around.

Best this month

  • Walls, paving and irrigation. The least rain to work around.

Turf still goes down. Winter laying is fine, it just takes longer to knit in before it can take normal foot traffic.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

September, this month

Growing season, September to November

Beds and lawns wake up fast. Peak planting months, and the last comfortable stretch to lay turf before the summer heat.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. Peak planting months.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

October, this month

Growing season, September to November

Beds and lawns wake up fast. Peak planting months, and the last comfortable stretch to lay turf before the summer heat.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. Peak planting months.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

November, this month

Growing season, September to November

Beds and lawns wake up fast. Peak planting months, and the last comfortable stretch to lay turf before the summer heat.

Best this month

  • Turf. Spring and autumn strike fastest.
  • Planting. Peak planting months.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

December, this month

Wet season, December to February

Hot, humid and stormy. Turf strikes fast on the back of real rain but wants watching for fungal patch, and dense new planting is better held a few weeks.

Best this month

Every job is workable this month, none is at its best.

Turf still goes down. Summer works with proper watering and an eye out for fungal patches after storms.

All year: mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Little and often keeps the form.

Services

What we build

A garden goes in as one job, not seven quotes from seven trades. The same crew draws it, prices it and builds it, so the levels still line up at the end.

Circular brick raised beds and tree surrounds stepping down a terraced garden under established trees.
Terraced, not bulldozed. Brick raised beds and tree surrounds stepping down a slope. Each ring holds the soil level around trees that were there first.

  • Garden design

    Levels, a concept plan and a planting plan, drawn around how the block sits and how you use the yard. Changes are made on paper first.

  • Retaining walls

    Concrete sleeper, timber or block walls that hold one level so the rest of a sloping block can be terraced. Ag drain and gravel behind every one.

  • Drainage and levels

    Surface fall, ag lines and pits that carry storm water away from the house and off the block lawfully. A licensed drainer makes the stormwater connection.

  • Turf

    Old lawn and weeds out, the ground shaped to fall, then new rolls laid on underlay, joints staggered and closed by hand. Variety picked for your light.

  • Paving and paths

    Pavers, aggregate or stepping stones on a compacted base. The edge restraint goes in first, and the path is laid to a fall so water runs off it, not under it.

  • Planting and irrigation

    Beds chosen for sun, shade and clay, planted into improved soil and mulched. Lawn and beds on separate zones from one controller, backflow prevention fitted.

Once the garden has taken, we also offer mowing, pruning and bed care on a set round. Offered at handover, never assumed.

Our work

Recent work

Paths, walls, beds and lawns. The details that decide whether a garden still looks right in its third summer.

A curved garden bed of red and green broad-leaf plants, edged by a low red-tipped hedge, beside a curved stone paver path.
A curved bed. Broad-leaf foliage held in by a clipped, red-tipped hedge. The paver path follows the same radius as the bed, so the two read as one line rather than two ideas.
A curved concrete path with a low edging wall running downhill through a tropical garden of banana plants and shrubs.
A path on a slope. It follows the fall instead of fighting it, with a low wall holding the bed on the high side and planting chosen for the light that reaches it.
Large grey stone pavers set in a grid with turf growing in the wide joints between them.
Pavers in turf. Joints left wide enough to grow grass in. Hard enough to walk on after rain, soft enough to look like lawn from the house.
A worker kneeling to lay clay pavers on a curved path, with edge restraint already pegged along both sides.
Laying a path. The edge restraint is pegged in first, so the path cannot creep. Then pavers go down on a compacted base, laid to a fall.
Two hands pressing a strip of freshly laid turf into place against a garden edge.
New turf. Every turf join is closed by hand, because that is where a lawn shows its seams a season later.
Worker seen from behind using a petrol line trimmer along a garden bed edge next to a timber paling fence.
Edging. A crisp edge along the bed is what makes a modest garden read as a kept one.
Grounds worker in hi-vis holding a long-handled tool while shaping a rounded ornamental tree, face hidden by the foliage.
A maintenance round. Shaping an ornamental. Little and often keeps the form, which is why a round is offered at handover, never assumed.

How a job runs

Levels first, then a fixed price

Four steps, and the price lands before the build starts.

  1. Free site visit

    We walk the block with you, take levels where the fall needs them, and note the aspect and the drainage.

  2. Plan and fixed quote

    A concept plan, a planting schedule and an itemised written quote. Any wall that needs an engineer is flagged here.

  3. Build

    A Before You Dig Australia enquiry goes in first. Work is scheduled around the weather, and the site is left tidy every afternoon.

  4. Handover

    We show you what went in, how to water it while it takes and what needs cutting when.

Local know-how

Built for Brisbane's west

Most of what goes wrong in a Brisbane garden goes wrong underground or over a boundary. This is what we plan around.

  • Clay soil

    From Kenmore to Pullenvale the soil runs to clay. Beds go into improved soil and get mulched to hold moisture through a dry July.

  • Sloping blocks

    Blocks out here fall hard. We take levels before quoting, and a wall holds one level so the rest can be terraced.

  • Storm water

    A February storm moves a lot of water in a hurry. Drains run to a lawful point of discharge, never over the neighbour's fence.

  • Walls over 1 metre

    A wall over 1 metre, or with a driveway, building or another wall close behind it, generally needs building approval and an engineer's design.

  • Before you dig

    Gas, water, power and telecommunications run under most Brisbane yards. Every dig starts with a free Before You Dig Australia enquiry.

  • Licensed work

    Building work in Queensland over $3,300 needs a QBCC licensed contractor. QBCC Licence 0000000 is on every quote.

Service area

Where we work

Based in Kenmore, serving Brisbane's western suburbs. Not on the list? Ring anyway. If you are close, we most likely come to you.

Find us on Google Maps
  • Kenmore
  • Kenmore Hills
  • Chapel Hill
  • Brookfield
  • Pullenvale
  • Fig Tree Pocket
  • Indooroopilly
  • Toowong
  • St Lucia
  • Taringa
  • Mount Ommaney
  • Jindalee
  • Sinnamon Park
  • Corinda

FAQ

Asked on almost every site visit

What turf suits a Brisbane yard with a shady side?

Sir Walter buffalo is the usual answer. It is a soft leaf buffalo that copes with heat and humidity and holds on in part shade better than most lawns. Where the lawn gets sun all day and water is the worry, a hybrid couch like TifTuf is worth a look, and Zoysia suits owners who would rather mow less often. We pick the variety against your block's light and how the lawn gets used, before anything is ordered.

When is the best time of year to lay new turf?

Turf goes down in Brisbane in most months, because the soil rarely gets cold enough to stop it rooting. Spring and autumn strike fastest. Summer works with proper watering and an eye out for fungal patches after storms, and winter laying is fine too, it just takes longer to knit in before it can take normal foot traffic.

How much watering does new turf need, and what about water restrictions?

New turf wants water daily for the first week or two to keep the root zone moist while it strikes, then every second or third day once it has taken. South East Queensland sits under permanent water conservation measures set by your water authority, so check the current rules for your address and we will plan the laying date around them.

Do retaining walls need council approval?

In Queensland, a retaining wall over 1 metre high, or one with a load such as a driveway, a building or another wall close behind it, generally needs building approval and an engineer's design. Lower walls are usually exempt, but councils can add their own rules, for example near a boundary. We confirm the requirement for your site before quoting, and an engineered wall is built to the engineer's drawings.

What are retaining walls made from, and which lasts longest?

Timber sleepers cost the least up front and have the shortest life. Concrete sleepers between galvanised steel posts are the common choice on Brisbane slopes because they do not rot and go in quickly. Block walls cost more and suit curves and taller walls. Every one of them needs drainage behind it, an ag pipe in free-draining gravel, so water pressure cannot build up after a storm.

How do you deal with drainage on a sloping block?

It depends on the fall. Sometimes it is surface shaping to move water away from the house, sometimes it is ag drains behind walls and under beds, and sometimes it is a wall to hold one level and terrace the rest. Stormwater has to end at a lawful point of discharge, not over the neighbour's fence, and where a pipe joins the stormwater system a licensed drainer makes that connection.

Should I plant natives or exotics?

Natives suited to South East Queensland are generally lower maintenance once established, because they are adapted to the rainfall pattern and the soil, and they bring birds in with them. Exotics give flowering, form and screening that natives do not always match. Most gardens out here end up a mix, chosen position by position rather than by one rule for the whole yard.

How long before a new garden looks established?

Turf takes light foot traffic in two to three weeks and full use at about six. Beds are slower. Small shrubs and groundcovers usually close up within one growing season, while screening hedges and feature trees take one to three years to reach the size they were chosen for.

What does a garden design cost?

It depends on the size of the block and how much of it is being redrawn, from a single bed through to a full front and back concept. The design fee is confirmed after the first site visit, once the scope is clear, and it is separate from the cost of building the garden.

Is the work priced as a fixed quote or by the hour?

Most jobs are a fixed quote against a written scope agreed after the site visit, covering the materials and the labour for the work described. Ongoing maintenance is the exception. That is priced per visit or on a regular round, because it is open ended by nature.

How long does a garden build take from start to finish?

A straightforward turf and planting job can be done in a day or two. A build with retaining walls, paving and irrigation usually runs from one week to several, depending on the scope, the weather and how much of the old yard has to come out first. The timeframe is part of the written quote.

Can you plant out the footpath verge in front of the house?

Usually, within limits. The verge belongs to council, and Brisbane City Council has guidelines on what can go there, covering plant height, clear sightlines for drivers and access to underground services. We check the current rules for your street, and lodge a Before You Dig Australia enquiry, before anything goes in.

Contact

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