Eco-Logic's New Customer Support Community
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
New Customer Support Community!
Eco-Logic has added a new customer support community. This is your space, dedicated to open conversation between customers and employees. It can be used in different ways -- to share great ideas, solve problems, and answer questions that will help everyone. Welcome!
Eco-Logic's New Customer Support Community
Eco-Logic's New Customer Support Community
Monday, January 25, 2010
Google Store
Check out the new Google store! It's under construction to more accurately reflect services available. For a complete list of services please visit www.ecologiclandscape.com
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
The Green Way to Increase Property Value
With the housing market the way it is, homeowners who want to sell need ways to get the most from the sale of their property while boosting its allure compared to other homes on the market so that it sells. Buyers can also have long-term value for their investment if the home's landscape is professionally designed by an ecological company. The homeowner can benefit from a greatly enhanced appearance to their home and an up to fifteen percent (15%) increase in the value of the property.
So here's how you, the homeowner, can maximize your property's resale value while getting the satisfaction of contributing to a healthier environment. First, learn what it means to be 'green' and choose a designer who knows how to maximize results for a minimum of action. That saves you money.
In choosing a landscape design company, look for one with relationships with green-minded construction companies, or 'builders.' A builder who understands the Permaculture point of view and doesn't try to convince you to veer away from the designer's plan will be a lot less costly, because you won't be charged for unnecessary tasks such as soil tilling. Look for a builder who has a partnership with a green design company, if not with the one who did your design then preferably with another design company that specializes in Permaculture or ecological design. Avoid a general contractor, as they will charge you much more to cover their own overhead costs than will a landscape contractor. Landscape contractor's also are able to install more than a general contractor, who has to sub-contract a landscape contractor to do your project properly, adding further to your cost.
A design by a professional Landscape Designer is a worthwhile investment in your property's value and the success of your landscape. Designers vary in experience and training, so research their background experience and schooling, and ask questions. Be prepared to pay a qualified professional for their services; many less highly-trained designers hook new clients by visiting a site for free, knowing the client will not be able to do anything significant or meaningful with the notes they get from the initial meeting. Once you understand what goes into a professionally designed landscape, you will want to have a designer on your project who charges what she or he is worth, so that you do not have to go back and redo mistakes you got a 'deal' on.
Do your homework, go with your gut - a friendly attitude and a responsiveness to your queries are important, and go green with an ecologically-focused design company. Your property will be beautiful and bring in more than if you go with tradtional 'ornamental' design and build service providers.
So here's how you, the homeowner, can maximize your property's resale value while getting the satisfaction of contributing to a healthier environment. First, learn what it means to be 'green' and choose a designer who knows how to maximize results for a minimum of action. That saves you money.
In choosing a landscape design company, look for one with relationships with green-minded construction companies, or 'builders.' A builder who understands the Permaculture point of view and doesn't try to convince you to veer away from the designer's plan will be a lot less costly, because you won't be charged for unnecessary tasks such as soil tilling. Look for a builder who has a partnership with a green design company, if not with the one who did your design then preferably with another design company that specializes in Permaculture or ecological design. Avoid a general contractor, as they will charge you much more to cover their own overhead costs than will a landscape contractor. Landscape contractor's also are able to install more than a general contractor, who has to sub-contract a landscape contractor to do your project properly, adding further to your cost.
A design by a professional Landscape Designer is a worthwhile investment in your property's value and the success of your landscape. Designers vary in experience and training, so research their background experience and schooling, and ask questions. Be prepared to pay a qualified professional for their services; many less highly-trained designers hook new clients by visiting a site for free, knowing the client will not be able to do anything significant or meaningful with the notes they get from the initial meeting. Once you understand what goes into a professionally designed landscape, you will want to have a designer on your project who charges what she or he is worth, so that you do not have to go back and redo mistakes you got a 'deal' on.
Do your homework, go with your gut - a friendly attitude and a responsiveness to your queries are important, and go green with an ecologically-focused design company. Your property will be beautiful and bring in more than if you go with tradtional 'ornamental' design and build service providers.
Save Money and Protect Your Health the Green Way
While working at my part-time job this afternoon, I happened to read an article on genetic engineering. The article was long and heavy-handed, the kind of investigative reporting that takes up a lot of brain power. But it got me thinking about how I could use my profession to address the issue of biodiversity loss in a format that could reach out to and empower my fellow citizens.
In Permaculture, food-producing plant communities are established so that homeowners can have much more free time, as well as free food they don't have to drive to acquire. It's 'Deep Green' because less oil and gasoline are used, a healthy soil web is protected, and other natural resources like water are harnessed and conserved.
So here's how you, the homeowner, can maximize savings while getting control over your health in a way no pill or diet can. First of all, you can utilize a method of Permaculture called the Fulcrum Principle. This means doing the least and getting the most from your action.
I always start with the soil, since it is the foundation for the processes we will be putting in place. To activate this principle, observe your landscape and decide if you need to remove traditional lawn grass before digging planting holes. If you have areas of tenacious turf, you can remove them with old cardboard boxes. Break up the boxes and overlap flat pieces directly on top of the grass. Atop this pile planting compost and plant directly into it.
If your property is more of a blank slate, with bare soil, you have less work to do. In both cases (after laying cardboard and planting compost over turf areas) dig planting holes and add a small handful of basic organic fertilizer. Place each plant and fill in the hole with soil. Step around the base of the plant to push out air pockets. Now add a generous layer of mulch to protect the plants from drying out. Mulch is also especially helpful for drawing soil-building earthworms and beneficial bugs that enrich the health of your plants and infuse them with healthy nutrients for you to eat. Water well and monitor for the first year to make sure they get enough to drink.
In a Permaculture garden, plant selection is carefully done so that symbiotic plant communities are set up. These plant relationships do much of your work for you, attracting pollinators and beneficial insect predators, shading some plants from hot sun, providing on-going sources of mulch from leaf-fall, fixing nitrogen, etc.
Edible gardens can feed you and your family in surprising and nourishing ways. From fresh flowers tossed onto a salad of vitamin-rich greens to a baked squash with nuts to strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries for desert you can constantly eat out of your backyard. With a larger property, animals can be incorporated to produce milk and meat. For the suburban or urban lot, small animals such as chickens can provide fresh, hormone- and antibiotic-free eggs and meat. Food stays fresher on the vine, too, so you can count on the benefits of antioxidants that haven't depleted under grocery store lights.
From a Landscape Architecture perspective, all of this complex ecology is guided into forms that shower your eyes, that of your friends and neighbors, and potential buyers, if you should want to sell, with delightful sights and smells. There are many more benefits to be gleaned from using a professional Permaculture or Landscape Design to develop a property. This kind of design is a quiet but powerful service that you can utilize if you want to enhance your health and pocketbook.
In Permaculture, food-producing plant communities are established so that homeowners can have much more free time, as well as free food they don't have to drive to acquire. It's 'Deep Green' because less oil and gasoline are used, a healthy soil web is protected, and other natural resources like water are harnessed and conserved.
So here's how you, the homeowner, can maximize savings while getting control over your health in a way no pill or diet can. First of all, you can utilize a method of Permaculture called the Fulcrum Principle. This means doing the least and getting the most from your action.
I always start with the soil, since it is the foundation for the processes we will be putting in place. To activate this principle, observe your landscape and decide if you need to remove traditional lawn grass before digging planting holes. If you have areas of tenacious turf, you can remove them with old cardboard boxes. Break up the boxes and overlap flat pieces directly on top of the grass. Atop this pile planting compost and plant directly into it.
If your property is more of a blank slate, with bare soil, you have less work to do. In both cases (after laying cardboard and planting compost over turf areas) dig planting holes and add a small handful of basic organic fertilizer. Place each plant and fill in the hole with soil. Step around the base of the plant to push out air pockets. Now add a generous layer of mulch to protect the plants from drying out. Mulch is also especially helpful for drawing soil-building earthworms and beneficial bugs that enrich the health of your plants and infuse them with healthy nutrients for you to eat. Water well and monitor for the first year to make sure they get enough to drink.
In a Permaculture garden, plant selection is carefully done so that symbiotic plant communities are set up. These plant relationships do much of your work for you, attracting pollinators and beneficial insect predators, shading some plants from hot sun, providing on-going sources of mulch from leaf-fall, fixing nitrogen, etc.
Edible gardens can feed you and your family in surprising and nourishing ways. From fresh flowers tossed onto a salad of vitamin-rich greens to a baked squash with nuts to strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries for desert you can constantly eat out of your backyard. With a larger property, animals can be incorporated to produce milk and meat. For the suburban or urban lot, small animals such as chickens can provide fresh, hormone- and antibiotic-free eggs and meat. Food stays fresher on the vine, too, so you can count on the benefits of antioxidants that haven't depleted under grocery store lights.
From a Landscape Architecture perspective, all of this complex ecology is guided into forms that shower your eyes, that of your friends and neighbors, and potential buyers, if you should want to sell, with delightful sights and smells. There are many more benefits to be gleaned from using a professional Permaculture or Landscape Design to develop a property. This kind of design is a quiet but powerful service that you can utilize if you want to enhance your health and pocketbook.
Monday, February 11, 2008
expansion update
i spent some of today working on updates to my website (www.ecologiclandscape.com). my mother is my website designer, but since she got sick i have been meticulously writing and formatting all of the content changes to make it easier for her. i'm so grateful that she has the skills she does and wants to work on my site.
i'm expanding my practice to include feng shui, which i've practiced for the last eight years, as well as to serve clients in all fifty states. the really exciting part, however, is also creating a new arm of my business focused solely on community service. i'll be putting the first 10% of all of my profits into a program in service of marginalized families. i'm currently developing the details, and i expect to be able to launch it in the next year, perhaps soon.
it's funny how the things one longs to do all one's life begin falling into place after a direction is chosen. landscape and permaculture design have offered me a vehicle to channel more of my interests together. this should be an exciting and invigorating year. i'm going to stick it out as vice president of acs (tribes.tribe.net/acs and www.sustainableshift.org) until my term is up in may and then focus on my project partnership. (tribes.tribe.net/deep_seeds) i've designed a kit for our fundraising project that i'm enthusiastic will offer simple ways for people to get involved and learn. acs should be an adequate vehicle for the work i want to do with the marginalized communities in and around portland. if it folds i will find a way to pursue the project via reserving 10% of my profits. there are several models in my head about how to do this.
i'm expanding my practice to include feng shui, which i've practiced for the last eight years, as well as to serve clients in all fifty states. the really exciting part, however, is also creating a new arm of my business focused solely on community service. i'll be putting the first 10% of all of my profits into a program in service of marginalized families. i'm currently developing the details, and i expect to be able to launch it in the next year, perhaps soon.
it's funny how the things one longs to do all one's life begin falling into place after a direction is chosen. landscape and permaculture design have offered me a vehicle to channel more of my interests together. this should be an exciting and invigorating year. i'm going to stick it out as vice president of acs (tribes.tribe.net/acs and www.sustainableshift.org) until my term is up in may and then focus on my project partnership. (tribes.tribe.net/deep_seeds) i've designed a kit for our fundraising project that i'm enthusiastic will offer simple ways for people to get involved and learn. acs should be an adequate vehicle for the work i want to do with the marginalized communities in and around portland. if it folds i will find a way to pursue the project via reserving 10% of my profits. there are several models in my head about how to do this.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Welcome to Eco-Logic's blog!
Welcome to Eco-Logic's (pronounced EE-KO-LAH-JIK) blog! Here you can find updates on my activities in the community and tips related to your landscape. Please feel free to leave a comment.
2007 was a busy year, including volunteering as garden designer and co-supervisor with Tim Hahn for Buckman's After School Program, hosting Seed Bomb workshops for the Village Building Convergence, joining the American Center for Sustainability's Board of Directors as Vice President, and deciding to expand Eco-Logic to serve clients on a national scale!
National Expansion update: My web designer (www.artonsite.com) is making updates to create a user-friendly site that will allow me to work with clients in all 50 states. I am very excited about this. The technology is efficient & easy to use, and my 15 months of experience serving clients in other states has me eager to present Eco-Logic to California and beyond. Check it out soon at www.ecologiclandscape.com or email me at jadene@ecologiclandsape.com if you have questions prior to site changes being up.
American Center for Sustainability (ACS) update: I have a project partnership proposal in the works to addresses the needs of marginalized families through Permaculture. If you aren't familiar with this ecological gardening system, you can read about it on my website or email me with questions, and I'll be happy to answer them! I am also really excited about this project and will update you via this blog when ACS is ready to accept project partnership proposals.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll come back!
:) Jadene
2007 was a busy year, including volunteering as garden designer and co-supervisor with Tim Hahn for Buckman's After School Program, hosting Seed Bomb workshops for the Village Building Convergence, joining the American Center for Sustainability's Board of Directors as Vice President, and deciding to expand Eco-Logic to serve clients on a national scale!
National Expansion update: My web designer (www.artonsite.com) is making updates to create a user-friendly site that will allow me to work with clients in all 50 states. I am very excited about this. The technology is efficient & easy to use, and my 15 months of experience serving clients in other states has me eager to present Eco-Logic to California and beyond. Check it out soon at www.ecologiclandscape.com or email me at jadene@ecologiclandsape.com if you have questions prior to site changes being up.
American Center for Sustainability (ACS) update: I have a project partnership proposal in the works to addresses the needs of marginalized families through Permaculture. If you aren't familiar with this ecological gardening system, you can read about it on my website or email me with questions, and I'll be happy to answer them! I am also really excited about this project and will update you via this blog when ACS is ready to accept project partnership proposals.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll come back!
:) Jadene
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