Two properties on the same street can need opposite work depending on whether they sit on the rise or in the hollow. We walk and probe before designing rather than assuming the neighbour's solution transfers.
Where we work from: our shop is at 7980 OH-249, Hicksville, OH. Forest Hills sits outside our home counties — call and we will confirm scheduling before you commit to anything.
Soil and drainage in Forest Hills
Retaining structures here do real structural work, and the drainage behind them is not optional. Drain tile at the base with an outlet to daylight, twelve inches of clean angular stone against the block, geotextile keeping soil out of that stone, and geogrid into compacted fill on anything with height. Walls that lean in this county were backfilled with soil.
Hardscape on shale-derived soil has to be detailed for saturated conditions rather than average ones: deeper excavation where the subgrade is soft, geotextile separating clay from the aggregate base, and roof water tied into solid pipe and carried past the hardscape before anything is built on it.
What Forest Hills properties need most
Small urban lots reward subtraction. Removing two overgrown shrubs that were never right for a three-foot space usually does more for a front elevation than adding five new plants, and it costs less.
The order that gets the most from a budget is almost always the same: drainage and grading first because everything else sits on top of them, then hardscape with sleeves and conduit run for anything you might add later, then structural planting, then beds and mulch, then lighting.
Winter in Forest Hills
Ice is the other half of the job. Repeated freeze-thaw across a long winter produces more liability than any single snowfall, so pre-treatment ahead of forecast events and material selected for actual pavement temperature do more good than a bigger plow.
Booking happens in the fall because routes are built geographically. A property added in January is either not going to be reached promptly or is going to displace somebody who booked in October, and we would rather tell you that now.
What Forest Hills properties call us for
These are the services this ground actually needs, ordered by what the soil and terrain in Cuyahoga County demand rather than by what is easiest to sell.
- Retaining Walls & TerracingEngineered walls with real drainage behind them — turning slopes you cannot mow into space you can use.
- Drainage Solutions & Yard GradingFrench drains, swales and regrading that move water away from your foundation before it costs you a basement.
- Spring & Fall CleanupsThe two visits a year that decide how the rest of the season goes — debris out, beds reset, leaves gone.
- Tree & Shrub TrimmingPruned at the right time of year, to the right cut — so plants stay in scale instead of getting sheared into boxes.
- Landscape LightingLow-voltage LED lighting that makes the yard usable after 5pm — which in Ohio is half the year.
- Sod Installation, Seeding & Lawn RenovationNew lawns, thin lawns and construction scars — graded, amended and established properly the first time.
Why Forest Hills property owners choose us
We know Cuyahoga County ground
Cuyahoga County sits in the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, where clay and shale-derived soils that hold water, with steep valley walls along the Cuyahoga and Rocky rivers. We plan around that rather than applying a template written for another part of the state.
We fix the water before anything else
Every dollar spent on plants or hardscape sitting on ground that stays wet gets spent twice. On Cuyahoga County soil we diagnose drainage first — and often the honest answer is two downspouts rather than a system.
46 Google reviews, licensed and insured
Verbatim reviews from neighbours across the region, full coverage on every crew and machine, and financing available so a full plan can be built in one season.
One contractor for all four seasons
Landscaping April through November and snow and ice through the winter, from the same crews. The people who stake a drive in November are the people who mowed it in July.
Nearby places we also serve
Forest Hills sits in Cuyahoga County. We cover these neighbouring communities too:
