J Brownlee Design

Services

We work to create truly distinctive and personalized outdoor living spaces for our clients, and we look forward to the opportunity to work together with you! Each of our designs is custom created to fit your personality and lifestyle as it blends with the natural characteristics of your project site. Whether we are working directly with you, or if we have partnered with your pool professional on your behalf, our goal is to get to know you, your family, and your style, then discover that special feature or focal point that works with your property and will make your new outdoor living space as unique as you!

We invite you to learn more about our concept design, design development, and construction management services below, beginning with the specific questions, concerns, and, well – fears you may have before you begin. We are here to work with you through this process, and look forward to seeing what we can create together!

“…Jason was very personable and extremely easy to work with. We had not engaged in a project of this magnitude before and Jason walked us through the process which gave us confidence in the end result. He listened to our design requirements and wishlist and developed a design that exceeded our expectations and compliments our backyard and house. He also included unique design elements that makes our pool and patio area standout in our neighborhood. Jason’s design also respected our budget so we never felt we were sacrificing a cohesive design or feature due to cost…”

– J. Phillips – Lakeland, Tennessee

For Homeowners

You are about to embark on an exciting and somewhat intimidating Services-For Homeowners Image-1 journey as you consider the possible addition of a swimming pool, entertainment patios, outdoor living features and landscape planting to create an extension of your home into its outdoor space. The key to a successful finished product at the end lies in how you answer the questions you have here at the beginning of this process. What do I want the new space to look like? What features will my family truly use and enjoy? What features would we never fully utilize and should be left out of the project? How will this work with the style of my home? Can the addition add value to my home? Where is the line between “wow” and “over the top”? Can this be developed in phases to give me a long-term plan that fits within my budget now and reserve space for features to add in the future? Can this be done in a way that doesn’t look pieced together? How will we grow into the space over the years?

Does this statement describe where you stand as you ponder these decisions today? – “I have an idea about what I want, but I don’t know how to put it together in a way that works for us and fits with our home — most importantly I just don’t want to mess it up with a bad decision or choice that I will regret later.”

This is where we can be your guide through the process. As you read through our planning process, conceptual design process, and our construction management services, our goal is to help you discover the vision that your family has for your outdoor space through the design, to help you fully comprehend the scope of the design through a powerful presentation, and to realize the full potential of the vision through the details and nuance of the construction process.

Let us show you how a minimal investment into your project here at the beginning will save you exponential time, frustration, and money as you create your dream space.

For Pool Professionals / Contractors

We invite you to Set Yourself Apart from your competition in a unique Services-For Contractors Image-1 way with our Professional Partnership approach for your development projects. A significant portion of our design projects arise from the relationship we cultivate with quality pool professionals and contractors as we partner with their companies on their client’s behalf. The creative design options we produce for these companies are focused on the “sweet spot” of blending a client’s personality and lifestyle with the natural characteristics of their site and the character of their home. From an industry professional’s perspective, partnering with J.Brownlee Design has several distinct advantages – allowing you a unique opportunity differentiate yourself from the standard, and raise your finished product to the next level.

We produce Creative and Realistic Design Solutions: Virtually every contractor has seen a pool or backyard design plan produced by a Landscape Architect or Architectural Design firm that may look pretty on paper, but is either a “pie in the sky” dream that is not structurally or fiscally buildable, or it is a generic solution that “misses the mark” by not addressing the specific lifestyle needs or expressed desires of your client. Either way, the proposed solution has no hope of being developed and serves as a waste of time, money, and paper – beginning a potential project off on the wrong foot. While I am a licensed Landscape Architect with a focus on creative design that exceeds our client’s expectations, I have also been a licensed contractor for over 12 years, with the specific construction knowledge and expertise needed actually build our designs. I am well versed and firmly footed in the residential pool and hardscape industry, and am a long-standing member and contributor for major industry associations, including APSP, Carecraft, and Genesis 3 Design Group. Our goal is to design a project that you can actually build and that fits within your client’s desired budget.

Space

We provide a “Wow Factor” Visual Presentation Package: Even the best design solution will never become a reality if it cannot be expressed in a way that the homeowner does not fully understand and subsequently does not approve. We provided a powerful presentation for our customers, including CAD design plan, multiple perspective sketches of the project design, and a complete virtual 3D model of the design, allowing your client to walk through and experience the new backyard as if it were already completed. Our goal is for our clients to fully comprehend and understand what is being offered to them.

Space

Your project will be Personally Designed by a Nationally Recognized and Award Winning Industry Professional: Creative design is what I do, and I am personally involved in the creative process behind each and every design solution we produce. I take pride in finding just what element, feature, focal point or material choice will make a project unique and stand apart from the rest. We are constantly striving to improve both by continued education through Genesis 3 and national industry conventions – looking to “push the envelope” in our designs by incorporating the latest advances in industry technology and to remain on the “cutting edge” of industry design trends.

This unique selling position option will stretch your limits, create new opportunities for your business, and expand the scope and possibilities of your projects. To learn more, visit the Pool Pros page on this website, and feel free to contact me directly to discuss an opportunity to work together.

Concept Design & Graphic Presentation

This first phase in our design process takes the initial concept ideas and philosophy discussed in the previous pages and begins implementing them for your specific project and needs. At our initial consultation meeting, I will listen to you, your ideas, visions, and concerns for your space. , I will learn about your family, about how you entertain, and about your expectations for how you will use your outdoor areas. I will also look at your existing home, the views and focal points created from the living areas, and the overall style, with a focus on how that style can be seamlessly extended into the outdoor room we are striving to create.

After this meeting, I take all of the information gathered and overlay the desires over the physical property information gathered related to the site. This includes aerial photographs, site plan, and topographic survey where available. A site inventory and analysis of your home and property will determine precise measurements, spot elevations, and pay specific attention to site lines from the home living areas with emphasis on desirable focal points and areas to be screened. Extensive site photographs are taken and used as reference during the concept design process. Existing vegetation location and elevations are mapped to be retained or removed in the design plans.

Once all site information and project scope information is compiled, the fun part begins for me. I create a CAD based concept design plan that works within the parameters provided to create a unique and creative solution to meet your design needs and begin to create a specific vision plan to follow throughout the remainder of the project design and development.

I also believe that the design for your project will only be successful if it is completely understood and comprehended by all parties as the project is being presented. For this reason, I take the extra time and effort to create a comprehensive full 3D virtual model of your existing home and project site, and displaying the design in a completed form, as if you are walking through the finished space before the project has even begun. With this key tool in place, you will feel comfortable and confident to move forward and make decisions that will ultimately impact the finished success of your new backyard.

Once the concept design plans and 3D design model have been created, we will schedule a time to meet and present the vision to you. This meeting serves as key intermediate stage in the concept design process. To date, we have taken your ideas and combined them with the site data and put our ideas and expertise to provide a solution on how the design could work. This meeting, however, is where we present the concepts and then begin working together with you as a team to garner your input and truly make the design unique to you and your tastes. We will ask for you to take a little time and fully understand the design as presented, then work together to revise as needed to create the final concept design plan that will fully realize your dreams and vision

Design Development Drawings:

(Structural Details / Hydraulic Design / Landscape & Lighting Design, etc.)

Beyond the Conceptual Design and 3D Model Development phase, our second specific design services for the development of your project is the detail design drawings to “flesh out” the specifics on the features and structures that have been proposed. These may include project technical drawings, such as structural or construction details (either standard, or for a specific feature desired in your design), construction specifications, poolhouse / accessory structure concept drawings, and material selections that may be desired or helpful to provide full understanding of these features by both homeowner and selected contractor. If desired, we will also prepare a standardized “bid sheet”, outlining the design specifics and equipment scheduled to be used for an “apples to apples” comparison between contractors bids — if the project is scheduled for bid. We will also prepare layout plans as needed or desired for your selected contractor to ensure the finished project layout matches the initial design that you have approved. Specifically, these design development drawings would include:

Pool, Spa, & Waterfeature Structural Sections & Details.
Site Layout & Dimension Plans for Pool, Spa, Waterfeatures, and Hardscape Structures.
Pool, Spa, & Waterfeature Hydraulic System Design / Pipe size Layout Plans.
Pool, Spa, & Waterfeature Equipment Set Schedule & Specifications.
Construction Specifications for Aquatic and Hardscape Feature Elements.
Poolhouse / Pavilion / Accessory Structure concept layout design.
Materials Selection & Specifications.
Standardized Bid Sheet w/ associated specifications & materials for contractor bid.
Site grading & drainage layout & design plans.
Landscape Irrigation System & Landscape Planting Design Plans.
Low Voltage Electrical System Design (Landscape Lighting/Outdoor Sound/etc.)
Other site or project specific design or technical drawings / details / specifications.

These design plans and options are available either as a complete design development drawing package (set of drawings), or as individual “a la carte” drawings on an as-needed basis. For a majority of residential projects, these drawings are not required or necessary in whole, but may be desired to further pinpoint the scope and scale of the project and reduce contractor bid ambiguity and overage

Construction Observation / Project Management:

Our final design service option is to see the project vision through and work hand-in-hand with you and your contractor(s) as an Owner’s Representative to take the project from concept to finished features throughout the construction process to ensure the project construction is progressing according to the approved design plans. Here I am as involved as our client’s wish me to be, and offer continued assistance with layout, revisions, material selections and project changes as the new features begin to take form and you begin to garner a greater understanding of what was originally proposed.

Through this process, your budget, contractor draw schedule, equipment / material / upgrade options are continually reassessed, with a consistent eye on ways to save money when possible, or help with option decisions that will add true benefit to your finished project. I also work with the coordination of multiple specialty trade contractors (swimming pool / hardscape / structures / landscape contractors), and ensure the complete scope of the project is addressed by each entity, and decisions made are good for the project as a whole — not just what is easier/best for one contractor at the future expense of the next trade. The goal here is to keep your project moving forward on-task, on-time, and on-budget, from beginning to end.