It's 2026, Fall, and we bought a new house in a nice neighborhood here in Lincoln, Ne. There are many houses with some nice landscaping, some trees here, a boulder there, and lots of flowers and mulch all over the place. The wife wanted something different. Something...special. She told me: "a cross between Mr. Myagi's backyard and Yosemite". Simple right? Well, one night while walking my attack golden retriever, I walked by this nice house a few streets over with incredible landscaping: beautiful flowerbeds, natural grasses, lighting, trees, and what was obviously a very thoughtfully planned design and was executed very well. I gathered the requisite courage and knocked on the front door. The nice couple who answered walked me around the property, and showed me what they had done. Then I heard the magic words: "we wanted something special, that wouldn't take a lot of upkeep, because we are not gardeners". Music to my ears - because I'm neither a gardener nor do I want to be. They told me that Jake at Tailored Landscapes was their guy. So I gave him a call. Here is my experience:
1. Jake set an appointment the same day and arrived with an assistant, on time, and smiling.
2. At the appointment, Jake and assistant spent around 30 minutes with me, asked me what I was looking for, what I wanted to avoid, and then went to work measuring and taking pictures. He told me he would email me a design within a few days.
3. Not two days later, the design arrived. Jake asked permission to come by and walk my wife and me through his plan and ideas. Mind you, we're not rich people, but we wanted something awesome and a yard which would stand out from the typical tree and single rock landscaping job, so we set a budget that was pretty healthy. Jake worked around our schedule, came by on time, then laid out an actual blueprint with accompanying pictures for my wife and I to look through. It was incredible. We're talking the works: dry creek bed, interesting trees, boulders, bushes, flowers, lighting, and flowering plants that would be easy to care for and would survive Nebraska's harsh climate swings. His pictures were helpful, and he invited us to his HQ in Bennet to actually see/select the trees and bushes we wanted.
*side note: our entire yard of grass would be torn out for this plan, except for a small minuscule sliver adjoining the sidewalk - when I pointed this out and asked Jake why not just remove all the grass, he answered: "I thought a palate cleanser would be appropriate when a person's eye leaves the sidewalk and begins enjoying the color explosion that awaits them in your yard" .....SOLD.
4. We paid a deposit, were informed our project would take about a month and would begin in 14 days. His crew was courteous, worked every day, all day, cleaned up our yard each evening, and even staked and fertilized our city tree that had been planted and then neglected by the HOA. The job took 21 days from start to finish, was done early, and is nothing short of amazing. Jake's crew at Tailored replaced and repositioned our sprinklers to irrigate the new yard properly, created gravel drain pits for the gutter down spouts, and put professional black plastic dividers between the grass and gravel/boulders/gigantic mounds of cedar mulch. The crew installed lighting which changes color via a remote, and Jake stopped by at least three times to check on the work (maybe more when we were not home and aware). He even shared a soda with me and invited me to join him at the Make a Wish Foundation Dinner in Lincoln as a guest of his business (which I promptly spaced and feel terrible for missing - next year count me in).
Bottom line, we were more than satisfied. Jake never pressured us to pay more or early. He was never anything but professional, even when My mother visited from out of state and asked to visit his HQ to pick out a tree or two as a house warming present - Jake was the definition of grace. We paid good money for this job, sure, but we expected to, and were blown away. While working with him, I had the consistent feeling that he would have treated us no differently whether we were working with a $5,000 or $50,000 budget.
I too am a local business owner, and the customer experience is everything to me - we don't survive if we merely satisfy our clients. Jake really shares this mindset, and although I can't speak for other reviewers, he earned this 5 star review 100% and I would recommend him and Tailored Landscapes to anyone considering a serious landscaping project that needs to be done right and who wants to be treated well. Call him, you will not be disappointed.
Come by my house anytime and ring my doorbell - I'll proudly show you our beautiful yard. I live in Wilderness Hills on Castle Pine Dr. Mine is the little single level house with the amazing landscaping!
Front Yard project completed September 2026
-Jay read more
