Gentle Giant's Gardening and Landscaping Services

I recently finished an extensive front yard conversion project with Core Landscaping and Gentle Giant's Landscaping (they work together), so I am going to leave feedback for both of them.

They are a true organic vegetable/edible garden landscaper, and I was really lucky to have found them. They delivered the best experience I've had with any contractors, and I managed an extensive remodel of my home as a general contractor, which means I cycled through many many contractors.

My project was to turn the ~2700 sqft front yard into an organic vegetable garden, and the scope was comprehensive, ranging from fences, vegetable boxes, mulching, soil prep, irrigation, planting and hardscape. Marc, John and his crew did an amazing job transforming my front yard into an aesthetically pleasing home farm that can provide enough food to feed our family.

Marc and John are both very well versed in organic farming, coming from farming roots back east. John in particular taught me so much about critical techniques about farming to get me started on the right path. More importantly, unlike most conventional landscapers out there who have no idea about how to grow food organically (I have had self-proclaimed organic gardening contractor offering to use Round-up for weed control!!), these guys actually practice what they preach, John is a subsistence organic farmer himself. He feeds his family with his own organic patch in his San Francisco home. He knows what to grow, where to grow, how to grow and gives very insightful information that can only come from a seasoned practitioner. I am particularly impressed with their attention to detail, when John sourced seeds for me, I didn't really specify my needs, but he was proactive enough to get me heirloom seeds so that I can try to practice saving my own seeds later. In another incident, an organic compost company that I insisted on using dumped their delivery outside of my fence in the street instead of in my driveway (my fault), the crew kept shoveling a mountain of compost back onto my garden till late at night so that my neighbors won't have an issue, all done proactively, without me saying a word. John hurt his back at the beginning of the project, but even if he was not on site, he was always available to communicate with me on every single detail.

I am a micro-manager with strong likes and dislikes, but with these guys, I never felt the need to watch over their shoulders, they are always a step ahead of me. They were not the cheapest bid, but came in to be very competitive, however, after interviewing and dealing with many landscapers, including those who market themselves as the organic vegetable gardener, Core and Gentle Giants definitely are the most knowledgeable and professional among them. I even used a couple of those so-called organic edible garden contractors from East Bay for initial design, their knowledge don't even come close to John's.

On the last day of the project, John spent a couple of hours teaching me how to plant seeds and do square foot gardening in my vegetable boxes. He took care of every aspect of my budding organic gardening career and I am so thankful to him. Just a couple of days after my front yard "mini farm" went into business, I have gotten so many inquiries and compliments from my neighbors.

We love John's work so much that we are having them back to do our backyards.

John the "Giant" and his professional crew transformed our backyard into a magical place eight years ago. Since then, we have enjoyed it as if it was a room in the house.
Initially, there were many challenges and hard choices to make about the existing plants. John turned every lemon into a lemonade. He wisely used and leveraged every existing tree while addressing our needs. He came up with a solution that was gorgeous and practical. His extensive knowledge of botany and the San Franciso climate alone is priceless. The materials he uses, such as stepping stones, are high quality, and the plants are as well.

With each year that passes, the garden looks better and better. Highly recommended!

They did a fabulous job installing a decomposed granite patio and flagstones in our backyard. We've trusted them with our garden maintenance for years. Pricing is fair and the team are consistent and kind. Highly recommend.

I can not say enough about Gentle Giants Gardening. They are so easy to work with. My back space was an overgrown mess, John and his team James and Ryan came in and took care of business. They then transformed my space into something I could it have imagined. They are so knowledgeable, and are so happy to shed that knowledge. I've learned so much this past week. I will always call on John the Gentle Giants gardening team for anything landscape, gardening, and outdoor things related. Thank you John

Gentle Giant Gardening is an awesome company and they specialize in drip systems! They installed my drought resistant plants and drip system a few years ago, and it worked perfectly! I recently had them back out to extend the drip system to include my new fruit trees on the side yard and it is amazing, couldn't be more satisfied, I highly recommend them!!

John and his team are fantastic. They listened and delivered completely transforming our front yard in the process. John is extremely knowledgable, kind and attentive to detail. Further his crew was hard-working, punctual and just generally did a great job. We'd highly recommend and will use him for our backyard too.

I can't thank John and his team enough for transforming our otherwise boring backyard into an edible garden space and the front yard into a beautiful drought tolerant garden. John is not just extremely knowledgeable and knows his stuff, but he goes the extra mile to help his customers learn different techniques, and tricks of urban gardening. John is genuinely interested in creating thriving garden spaces for his customers. I appreciate all that he and his team has done for us and will continue to work with them.

Wouldn't even consider hiring this company. Least professional approach to giving an estimate. How can one give an estimate without actually seeing the garden in person? a few iPhone pics does not do it. Every other landscaper or gardening professional manages to find a little time to come by and take a look. Why go with someone who couldn't bother? And they are certainly not the least expensive in the area.

We were very happy with the quality of work that this company did. However, because of the size of our garden it required more attention than the crew could give.

They were never able to complete the entire yard and had to rush off to the next job. This went on for three visits and we finally decided that they couldn't handle our yard. In hindsight I could've reached out to the company, but the supervising landscaper at the time could have done the same in order to sure they had more time to complete the work.

We love Gentle Giants!


We wanted to take out an overgrown, poorly maintained, sloped front yard from a home we recently bought in Pacifica and replace it with drought tolerant flowers and grasses. John is knowledgeable, friendly, and very responsive. His team was efficient and easy to work with. I sent him an e-mail this week to ask about watering (the long term plan is just once a year once it's established - but I'm not sure if it's "established" yet) - and he's going to swing by next week when he's in the area to check on the yard and let me know. We use their maintenance service as well - and Terri is also lovely and responsive. It brings me joy every time I look out the kitchen window to see our beautiful front garden - and it's been in place only about 10 months. It also feels good to support a family run, locally owned, green business.

We moved into a house whose entire yard was thick with foxtails - very dangerous for our long-haired dog. John and his crew ripped it all out, then put in heavy cardboard and gorilla hair mulch to keep it out.

John is a true expert on the local plants in the bay area. Whenever we had an inkling of "we like this" or "we don't like that", he had a deep trove of plants and design ideas to pick from. We've had our garden for a couple months now, and all of the plants are doing great.

If you want to 180 transform a yard, I couldn't recommend Gentle Giants more.