Fort Worth Landscape Architect

Fort Worth straddles the boundary between two distinct geological formations. Eastern Tarrant County sits on deep Blackland Prairie clay — the same expansive shrink-swell clay that characterizes Dallas, creating chronic hardscape movement and planting challenges if not explicitly accounted for in design. Western Tarrant County and Parker County transition to the Cross Timbers formation, with shallower, sandier soils, more topographic relief, and a post oak woodland plant community that differs entirely from the Blackland Prairie. Landscape architects in Fort Worth must identify which geological context applies to a given project site and design accordingly — the hardscape specifications, soil amendment strategies, and plant palettes that work on a Cross Timbers site in Aledo are different from what works on a Blackland Prairie site in Arlington.

Fort Worth’s Unified Development Code (UDC) establishes landscape area requirements, parking lot tree coverage standards, street tree planting standards, and buffer yard requirements for new development within city limits. The UDC also includes tree preservation provisions requiring documentation and mitigation for protected trees removed during development. Fort Worth’s development code requirements are periodically updated as the city’s planning framework evolves — we stay current on the applicable standards and produce plans documented to meet UDC requirements on the first submission.

Yes. Johnson County and Parker County are among the fastest-growing markets in the Fort Worth metro, with active residential and commercial development in Burleson, Crowley, Cleburne, Joshua, Weatherford, and Aledo. Each jurisdiction has its own landscape requirements. We maintain working familiarity with the landscape standards of the major Fort Worth suburban municipalities and the county frameworks that govern unincorporated development.

Contact us through our website or call our office. We will schedule a brief discovery call to understand your project type, location, geological context, and schedule, and follow up with a proposal.

We typically start from the civil engineer’s preliminary grading and drainage plan, the utility layout, and any available floodplain or detention data, along with a tree survey where one exists. On Blackland Prairie sites east of the city, we also request soil boring or geotechnical data early, since expansive clay conditions affect both planting and hardscape design decisions. On Cross Timbers sites to the west, rock outcropping and shallow soil depth shown on the topographic survey shape our grading coordination. Starting from these documents lets us align our landscape and irrigation plans with the civil design before construction documents are locked, which reduces redesign cycles later in the process.

Yes. We regularly step into projects already in progress when a developer needs to recover schedule or resolve plan review comments a prior consultant hasn’t addressed. We start with a review of the existing landscape, planting, and irrigation documents against the current civil set and the applicable Fort Worth or Tarrant County municipal requirements, identify any gaps or conflicts, and produce a revised submission package. Because our land planning, planting, hardscape, tree disposition, and irrigation services are performed in-house, we can take over the full landscape scope or a single discipline without adding another layer of subcontractor coordination.

Yes. Several Tarrant County municipalities impose seasonal or drought-triggered outdoor watering restrictions, and our irrigation designs are engineered to perform within those limits rather than assume unrestricted water availability. We hydraulically size zones, select controller and sensor technology, and specify plant-appropriate application rates so the system stays code-compliant and water-efficient whether restrictions are in effect two days a week or year-round. All designs are coordinated with TCEQ landscape irrigation licensing requirements and documented for competitive bidding.

landscape and irrigation submittals are typically reviewed alongside the broader civil plan set rather than on an independent track. Early coordination with the civil engineer’s grading and drainage schedule, and a first submission documented to current UDC standards, are the two factors most within a landscape architect’s control for avoiding review comments that add cycles to the schedule. We build our submission packages to meet Fort Worth’s current landscape and tree preservation standards on the first pass.