ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT: Mario Cambardella establishes ServeScape, an online plant nursery and design studio serving the Atlanta and Athens areas

When Mario Cambardella (BLA ’06, MEPD ’11, MLA ’13) was operating his small design build firm back in 2012, he wished there was a way to easily order locally grown plant material for on-site delivery. It was then that he came up with the initial concept for ServeScape – an online marketplace for plants sourced directly from local farmers and wholesalers.

After several years of ideation and planning, Cambardella launched ServeScape in March 2020. What may have initially seemed like a challenge, aligning with the first lockdowns from COVID-19, turned out to be a tremendous opportunity for the company. With many brick and mortar businesses temporarily closed, ServeScape began getting more and more inquiries from individuals looking to purchase landscape and house plants from the comfort of their home. This helped grow the business from its initial target market of design-builders to a more general populace.

Today, ServeScape offers products and services via their plant marketplace and design studio all with the mission to “serve your scape”. Based in the Atlanta and Athens geographic areas, they strive to streamline the process from inspiration to installation by providing clients with site-specific landscape and planting plans, a list of vetted contractors to help complete the job, and the ability to order quality plant materials for delivery to a home or project site in just a few clicks.  

In many ways, Cambardella views his mission for ServeScape as a continuation of his work as the first urban agriculture director at the City of Atlanta. In both roles, he has strived to enable access to beautiful and functional landscapes to everyone. Of his role with the city, he states “it was about enabling access [to food] for people that lived in low income low access areas”. In his current role, he enjoys enabling farmers access to the marketplace, and customers access to high quality local plant materials at affordable prices.

ServeScape operates with a staff of nine, including landscape designers, horticulturalists, and tech and supply chain experts. To hear directly from Cambardella and ServeScape staff and CED alumna Tori Simmons (BLA ’11), view the videos below where they discuss their work, as well as insights and advice about their experience as landscape architects and designers.

To learn more about ServeScape, visit their website at https://servescape.net/ or follow them on Instagram at @servescape.