Pollock Landscape Architects is a landscape architecture and site planning firm dedicated to creating engaging and memorable human-oriented outdoor spaces. We strive to design elegantly functional places that respond thoughtfully to their context and poetically to their users.
We draw our inspiration from history and from architectural design theory. We value the timelessness of simplicity. We believe that design forms and vocabularies should arise from the interpretation of project-relevant characteristics that reflect the identity of the program, the site and its users.

Founded in 2002 as pollock+partners, PLA is based in the Midtown neighborhood of Sacramento, California. The firm is a small group of seasoned professionals that collaborate with one another and with planners, architects, engineers to achieve complex project results like LEED™ certification and integrated site storm water facilities. We are committed to principles of green, environmentally sustainable landscape planning and design which are inherently holistic in their concept and nurturing in their application.

Design Approach

FORMULATION

We are communicators and educators. We carefully listen to our client’s expectations in formulating the project’s big picture. We educate clients regarding project costs, design approach, site maintenance, and sustainability issues well before the design process begins. We are more than just consultants – we are trusted advisors.

INVESTIGATION

We are tireless in our search to compile project-relevant background information and in this effort we leave no stone unturned. We believe that a successful project’s sense of place can arise only from characteristics inherent to the site/context, and that these characteristics should be largely identified prior to the start of design.

EXAMINATION

There’s both an art and a science to Site Design. As Site Planners our approach arises from objective interpretive tools like site analysis and functional diagramming. This is an exploration that pairs the opportunities and constraints of the site with the requirements of the program. The results yield the basis for an optimal design framework.

VISUALIZATION

We investigate the potential influence of subjective characteristics such as history, geography, and cultural identity on all elements and their organizations of the functional site model. We believe that poetic visualization and interpretation can generate relevant concepts for forms and configurations whose meanings contribute to the overall richness of a projects’ sense of place.

CONCEPTUALIZATION

We don’t invent the design solution, we discover it.

ARTICULATION

We believe that a place is a gathering of experiences that are sponsored inherently by its physical forms and their organization. Our site design concepts arise from a combination of applied logic and inspired expertise. The configuration of our program elements and the character of our details and materials arise from our understanding of the project and its users.

OPTIMIZATION

Throughout the process we habitually design to a set of quality standards that we call the client service litmus test. These standards include cost efficiency, constructability, water efficiency, maintainability, and sustainability. There’s a reason why we are trusted advisors.

IMPLEMENTION

We know site construction and we love to build. Since we design with this knowledge and experience in mind, our Construction Documentation is straight forward, complete, easily biddable and highly buildable. Our construction expertise helps assure that projects come in on time and on budget.

REALIZATION

We are never more than a phone call away during construction. Our CA phase services can contribute substantially to both the short and long term quality of a built project. We encourage user-friendly professional service contracts with flexible on-call terms at reasonable hourly rates.

 

OFFICE

Offices located in Sacramento, CA
Staff Resources (4):
1 – Licensed Landscape Architect, LEED AP certified
1 – Licensed Landscape Architect (hourly consulting-offsite)
1 – Certified Senior Irrigation Designer (hourly consulting-offsite)
1 – CAD Drafter (hourly consulting-offsite)

 

Jim Pollock has been practicing Landscape Architecture in Northern California for 25 years. Jim earned his bachelor’s degree from the Ohio State University. He attended graduate school at Cornell University where he completed the MLA program with a minor in history of architecture and architectural design theory.

Jim started his career at the Office of Dan Kiley working on projects nationwide that span the spectrum of typological sectors including estates, parks, museums, hospitality, and corporate campuses. This included institutional projects like the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden in Wash DC, the Buck center for Research on Aging in Novato (IM Pei), and the Saint Louis Art Museum Expansion. Residential design work included homes for clients including Donald and Adele Hall (Hallmark Cards), sculptor Joel Shapiro, and estates in LA like the former Samuel Goldwyn-Mayor residence purchased by David Geffen and the former Peter Fonda residence purchased by producer Norman Lear.

Jim practiced and networked in the Bay Area for five years before becoming a founding partner in Quadriga Landscape Architecture and Planning in 1997. He was principle in charge of Sacramento’s highly successful Cesar Chavez Plaza renovation in 2000 and the California Department of Motor Vehicles campus Master Plan and Phase One site renovation design.

Jim opened his own office, pollock+partners, in Midtown Sacramento in 2002 specializing in civic, healthcare, and commercial work. The 50 acre KP Modesto Medical Center and the Department of Motor Vehicles Phase 2 campus site work projects were completed during this period. Today, Jim is principal and sole owner of Pollock Landscape Architects. Over the years his practice has grown to include housing, parks and recreation, commercial and hospitality work.

 

EDUCATION

B Sc Agriculture, Ohio State University, Columbus Ohio
MLA, School of Art, Architecture and Planning, Cornell University, Ithaca New York

 

LICENSURE

Registered Landscape Architect, State of New York #1637
Registered Landscape Architect, State of California #4453

 

CERTIFICATION / MEMBERSHIP

American Society of Landscape Architects, Member
US Green Building Council, Member
LEED™ Accredited Professional