Across our St. Louis work, drainage and water management often play a major role, from roof runoff and erosion to standing water around new hardscape. Our local crew brings 25+ years of hands-on experience coordinating drainage, grading, landscaping, and hardscaping around the needs of each property.
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Water has been one of the most consistent conditions across the St. Louis projects featured on this page, but the source and solution have varied from property to property.
We’ve worked with roof runoff releasing beside a foundation, erosion caused by moving water, and standing water in an area planned for new hardscape. Those projects required different combinations of underground piping, drain boxes, grading, retaining structures, and patio construction.
The common thread is that the drainage had to work with the rest of the property. Where new hardscape or retaining walls were involved, water movement became part of the project planning rather than something addressed afterward.
Across our St. Louis work, we’ve addressed foundation runoff, erosion, standing water, and drainage conflicts around new hardscape using combinations of underground drainage, drain boxes, grading, drainage stone, and properly prepared bases.
Because our crews work across drainage, retaining walls, patios, and grading, we plan those systems together. Before the finished surface goes in, we look at where water is coming from, how it moves through the property, where it needs to discharge, and how the surrounding grade will affect the finished installation.
The goal is not simply to make the project look right on the surface. It is to build the drainage, grade, and support conditions that help the entire outdoor space perform properly over time.
Among the St. Louis properties we’ve worked on, several conditions have come up repeatedly, from runoff and erosion to standing water and limited working space. These are real site conditions our crews have had to plan around while building drainage, hardscape, retaining wall, and landscape projects.
Poor drainage and water management are some of the most common issues we see in St. Louis yards. We use French drains, buried downspouts, drain boxes, grading, and other solutions to help move water away from problem areas.
Moving water can repeatedly carry soil away from low or sloped areas, creating erosion that gets worse over time. On projects like these, we address grading and drainage together to give runoff a more controlled path through the property.
We’ve worked on patio projects where the exact area homeowners wanted to make usable was also where water collected. In these situations, drainage, grading, and hardscape planning work together so the finished space can function properly.
Drainage routes do not always have open space to work with. We’ve installed systems in tight areas beside foundations, concrete driveways, and other existing features, carefully planning the route around the property while still directing water where it needs to go.
Landscaping projects often involve more than selecting plants. The surrounding hardscape, bed lines, grade, existing home, and permanent features all influence how the finished yard comes together.
This featured St. Louis project shows how one homeowner combined new plantings, stone edging, driveway definition, and a retaining wall into a coordinated front-yard improvement rather than treating each element as a separate upgrade.
These projects were completed in surrounding St. Louis communities and show how we’ve approached similar retaining wall, drainage, patio, and landscape challenges across the area. Each project reflects real site conditions, homeowner goals, and solutions that may be relevant to properties in St. Louis as well.
Excel Landscaping works with homeowners dealing with roof runoff near the home, standing water, erosion, saturated low areas, and drainage problems around patios, retaining walls, and other hardscape. Depending on how water moves through the property, the solution may include French drains, drain boxes or catch basins, buried downspouts, underground drainage, channel drains, and grading corrections. Excel Landscaping
Some do. Current St. Louis County guidance requires a retaining-wall permit in unincorporated areas when the wall exceeds 3 feet in height, exceeds 2 feet while supporting a surcharge such as a driveway or pool, sits close enough to a property line to trigger county requirements, has a fence or guardrail that brings the combined height above 6 feet, or affects an existing drainage path or swale. Requirements can also differ in municipalities, so the property and proposed wall should be checked before construction begins.
The timeline depends on the scope, access, grade, drainage, materials, and how many parts of the property are being improved together. Recent Excel Landscaping projects featured across the area include several approximately 2-day builds, while a larger Oakville retaining-wall project took about 7 working days. More involved or multi-feature projects can require additional time. Excel Landscaping
Yes. These improvements often affect one another. Grade determines how water moves, drainage can affect where a patio or retaining wall should go, and hardscape changes how the surrounding landscape connects to the property. Excel Landscaping works across those services so related conditions can be accounted for before the finished installation goes in rather than corrected afterward.
Excel Landscaping serves homeowners throughout St. Louis and surrounding St. Louis County communities. Current dedicated service areas include Wildwood, Webster Groves, Town & Country, Oakville, Ladue, Kirkwood, Chesterfield, and Ballwin, with work also completed in other nearby communities across the county.
