Gardens made
for living.
Naturalistic garden design and planting accross Melbourne and the Dandenong Ranges
I’m Josh. I design naturalistic gardens for people who want their outdoor space to feel as considered as the rest of their home.
Hill studio works across Melbourne and the Dandenong Ranges. Mostly residential. Some venues. Always gardens that are built to evolve.
SERVICES
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Where every Hill Studio garden starts.
A 60-90 minute visit to your space, on site, where I walk it slowly and talk through how you actually live there what works, what frustrates you, what you’d want it to do in a year. You’ll get my honest read on the spot, and a written follow-up the next day with direction, plant ideas and a rough budget so you know where things could go.
This is for anyone at the start of thinking about their garden and wanting a clear, considered direction before spending on a full design or build. -
The full design, yours to build at your own pace.
Concept Design gives you the direction: a layout, a mood board and the key plants, so you can see the garden before committing. Full Design gives you everything needed to build it, with every plant chosen, counted and placed, ready for you, your landscaper, or me. -
One day. A tired garden, brought back to life.
A single focused day on an existing garden editing what’s not working, replanting, restyling and re-mulching so the space feels considered again. No full redesign, no upheaval; just the right hands making the right moves in a day.Ideal for a garden with good bones that’s lost its way, or a property you want lifted before selling.
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A garden designed and planted, start to finish.
This is the heart of what I do. A complete naturalistic garden designed around how you live and what your site actually wants, then fully installed: soil prepared, beds planted, mulched and watered in, ready to settle and grow into itself over the seasons. Layered, alive, chosen for movement and texture, and built to age well rather than peak on day one.For homeowners who want a genuinely considered garden and a single person who designs it, plants it, and stands behind it.
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The whole outdoor space - one person holding it all together.
Everything in Design + Build, plus I manage the trades the larger projects need: concrete, decking, drainage, lighting, structures. You deal with one person, me and I coordinate the rest so the hard and soft landscape come together as one considered space, not a series of disconnected jobs.
For more involved transformations where the garden is part of a bigger outdoor project and you’d rather not juggle five contractors yourself.
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Keeping a Hill Studio garden looking like one.
Quarterly visits to gardens I’ve designed pruning, editing, seasonal care and the small decisions that keep a naturalistic planting reading as intentional rather than overgrown. Naturalistic gardens are low-maintenance, not no-maintenance, and the difference over years is whoever’s making those calls.Offered to existing design and build clients, to protect the investment and keep the garden ageing well
Recent Work
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![A garden scene featuring a brick column, various flowering plants, shrubs, and trees with greenery in the background.]()
Ashwood Garden
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![A potted plant with green leaves in a gray planter on a gravel pathway. To the left, there are additional plants and a black lattice fence with climbing plants. To the right, there is part of a beige house wall and a window with white trim.]()
Kew Courtyard
THE APPROACH