Land Language

In this episode of Land Language, we sit down with Emma Kraft Saldivar, President of Kraft Custom Construction, the Salem, Oregon design-build remodeling company her father, Robert Kraft, started in 1982. Emma came to construction from psychology and case management, and she brings that background into every project and client conversation.

Emma describes “longevity planning” as designing homes around how clients live now and in the future, focusing on purpose, feelings, routines, community, and wellness.

CHAPTERS:

00:00 Start

00:33 Meet Emma Kraft Saldivar

01:56 Designing for Future You

04:19 From Psychology to Construction

08:03 Project Types and Service Area

09:10 Discovery Call and Fit

10:57 Curiosity Builds Trust

13:43 Homes for Community

17:37 Wellness and Hobby Spaces

19:51 Budgeting for Longevity

23:36 Where to Spend vs Save

27:30 Invest in Infrastructure

31:23 Stormwater and Regenerative Design

33:44 Leading Change on Teams

34:25 Collaborating Early Pays Off

38:20 Building the Right Expert Team

43:02 Emma’s Next 20 Years

44:03 Closing Thoughts

Follow Emma:

https://www.kraftcustomconstruction.com/

https://www.instagram.com/kraftcustomconstructioninc/

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

About Emma:

Emma Kraft Saldivar is the second-generation owner and president of Kraft Custom Construction, a design-build remodeling company serving Oregon’s Willamette Valley since 1982. She leads the company with a focus on thoughtful design, lasting craftsmanship, and creating homes that support the way people live today while standing the test of time. With a background in social work, Emma brings a people-centered approach to the remodeling process, grounded in listening, understanding her clients’ needs, and helping them make informed decisions about their homes.

Hosts Brit Sastrawidjaya and Bethany Rydmark close out Season 2, and share what changed how they run their own teams, what's happening underground that most landscapers never measure, and why the same values keep showing up whether you're in the Pacific Northwest or rural Australia. They also discuss the challenge and value of hosting controversial episodes and inviting honest dialogue.

CHAPTERS:

00:00 Start

00:33 Season Two Reflections

01:20 Handling Controversy

03:03 Community Dialogue Matters

05:19 Season Three Vision

07:25 Favorite Season Two Guests

08:06 Global Lessons and Values

09:56 Stories That Inspire Change

13:18 Scaling Regenerative Business

15:25 Stewardship Mindset Shift

16:57 Backyard Aliveness

20:40 Time Perspective and Care

22:13 Woo Woo and GeoTuning

23:45 Industry Builders and Events

25:45 Generational Wealth of Land

27:11 Legacy for Our Kids

29:16 Purpose and Response

30:58 Celebrate and Stay Connected

32:11 Closing Thoughts

Follow Brit and Bethany:

Brit: https://be.land/

@theblueprintearth

Bethany: https://www.bethanyrydmark.com/

@brydmarklandscapes

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

In this episode of Land Language, host Brit Sastrawidjaya sits down with Mark Woolbright, founder of Verdtech (verdtech.com), maker of Varden, a lightweight, plantable retaining wall and vertical garden block system. Mark invented one of the first plantable concrete retaining wall systems in the US after seeing vertical gardens built into small Swiss retaining walls on a backpacking trip, spent decades engineering drainage, soil, and structural systems for that original system before industry consolidation moved him to sell, and has now rebuilt the idea from the ground up as Varden.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Start

00:33 Meet Mark Woolbright

02:38 Europe Inspiration

04:06 Concrete Wall Business

07:55 Engineering and Drainage

11:57 Soils Compost Carbon

14:50 Industry Consolidation Exit

19:20 Why Plastic Blocks

22:28 Testing Policy Barriers

28:33 Design Focus and Planting

40:09 Marketing Webinars Education

50:03 Habitat Toad Condos

54:42 Closing Thoughts

--

Follow Mark:

Website: https://www.verdtech.com/

Verdtech on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Greenwallmojo

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

--

ABOUT MARK WOOLBRIGHT:

Mark Woolbright is an inventor and innovator of living walls with over 30 years in design, manufacture, marketing, and installation of plantable, living wall systems. Mark graduated from Eastern Illinois University and is currently Managing Member of Greenwall Ventures, LLC, and most recently, CEO/Founder of Verdtech, Inc. Throughout his career, he has been awarded twenty patents, with more applications pending. Mark has served on the Board of the St. Louis USGBC, as a member of the Green Wall Committee of GRHC which develops course curriculum for its Green Walls 101 course and has been a certified Biophilic Design trainer through GPGB. He is passionate about educating the building community on the environmental benefits of Living Walls and best practices for their use.

ABOUT LAND LANGUAGE:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

Sarah Lebner is the founder and director of Cooee Architecture, a sustainable residential practice based in the alpine region of south-east Australia, where she designs energy-efficient, low-carbon homes for rural and regional communities.

We discuss bushfire-resilient design beyond codes, including defensible sites and landscape strategies, and contrast Australian mandates for rainwater tanks and firefighting reserves with U.S. approaches.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

02:49 Sarah’s Origin Story

06:23 Trust and Greenwashing

09:12 The 18 Intentions

11:56 Bushfire Resilient Design

16:31 Rainwater Rules and Storage

22:12 Energy Ratings and Retrofits

33:26 Sharing Knowledge at Scale

38:41 Better Team Collaboration

46:02 My First Architecture Job

48:51 Why It’s Called Cooee

50:13 Getting Back to Yourself

51:47 Closing Thoughts

Follow Sarah:

Website: https://www.cooeearchitecture.com.au/

Xera Plants on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cooee_architecture

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

About Sarah:

Sarah Lebner is the founder and director of Cooee Architecture, a sustainable residential practice based in the alpine region of south-east Australia, where she designs energy-efficient, low-carbon homes for rural and regional communities. Before returning to the area she grew up in, Sarah was Principal Architect at Light House Architecture and Science in Canberra, one of Australia's leading building science practices, where she spent years working at the intersection of passive design, thermal performance, and affordability. She is the author of 101 Things I Didn't Learn in Architecture School, a 2023 recipient of the Australian Institute of Architects Dulux Study Tour Prize, and the sole winner of the Institute's 2020 National Emerging Architect Prize. Alongside her architectural work, Sarah runs Cooee's scalable resources arm, creating affordable tools and guides to help everyday homeowners retrofit their homes for comfort and efficiency.

Molly Sedlacek is the founder of ORCA, a female-founded landscape design and product studio based in Los Angeles. In this episode, she shares how her upbringing with a landscape-designer mother and forester father shaped her belief that materials are living participants, emphasizing simplicity, permeability, and designing for visible time and patina rather than permanence.

We address fire-smart landscape design, including Class A fire-rated black locust lumber and the importance of keeping trees, plus advocacy through client questionnaires that tap sensory memories.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

00:34 Meet Molly of ORCA

02:49 ORCA Name and Roots

04:14 Nature First Design

08:06 Client Questionnaire Prompts

11:37 Designing for Enough

13:41 Visible Time in Gardens

16:39 Local Materials and Pavers

23:30 Wood and Fire Smart Design

31:46 Advocacy Through Education

34:57 Docent Workshops Launch

42:28 Patina Over Maintenance Free

49:19 Rethinking Concrete and Pools

54:32 Closing Thoughts

Follow Molly:

Website: https://www.orcaliving.com/

ORCA on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/orcaliving/

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

In this episode of Land Language, we sit down with Julie Weiss, a designer and gardener based in the Pacific Northwest and board member of the North American Friends of Great Dixter. Julie spent eighteen years at Vanity Fair. She then went on to apprentice for two years at Great Dixter under head gardener Fergus Garrett, and came home calling herself a garden steward instead of simply a designer. Julies shares with us: cover planting standards, soil and aftercare, trusted research sources, and the value of native plants for resilience and biodiversity.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

02:43 From Art School to Magazines

03:51 Roof Garden Awakening

04:36 Great Dixter Training Years

06:00 Design Skills Carry Over

08:45 Biodiversity and Bug Love

10:43 How Dixter Teaches

13:34 Planting Standards and Soil

16:43 Regenerative Soil Practices

22:23 Natives and Nursery Education

24:18 Garden Culture England vs US

28:00 Resilient Gardens and Ethos

32:39 Native Plants Ease Anxiety

33:04 Manzanitas and Dry Summers

33:59 Stewardship and Bossy Natives

35:27 Realistic Garden Maintenance

37:21 Succession Planting Basics

42:00 Matrix Planting Over Mulch

43:45 Control Culture and Invasives

46:58 Gardens That Move and Biodiversity

49:43 Old World Ethos and Materials

54:45 Gardening for Wildlife and Hope

56:45 Ecological Design Ripple Effects

58:46 Closing Thoughts

Follow Julie:

Website: https://www.julieweissdesign.net/

Instagram: @julieaweiss

Follow Land Language:

Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

In this episode of Land Language, hosts Brit Sastrawidjaya and Bethany Rydmark sit down with Andrea Palacio, co-founder of Crewless. Andrea walks through how she used AI to rescue her Florida lawn care company from near-collapse, and what she learned when she stepped too far away.

Andrea went from answering 50+ calls a day with a newborn in her arms to building Crewless: an AI implementation consultancy that helps home service businesses get their time back.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

00:53 What AI Implementation Means

03:13 Crewless Origin Story

05:47 Crisis Sparks Automation

08:16 Quick Wins With AI

11:45 AI for Human Connection

17:39 Leadership Cannot Be Delegated

21:52 Scorecards and Metrics

26:19 Regenerative AI Concerns

33:03 Balancing Innovation and Nature

40:22 Policy and Data Centers

49:10 How to Work With Andrea

54:06 Closing Thoughts

Follow Andrea:

https://www.instagram.com/andreapalacio

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Andrea:

Andrea Palacio is co-founder of Crewless, an AI implementation consultancy helping home service businesses solve operational problems with AI. She and her husband also co-own a Florida lawn care company, where she first built the systems that became Crewless. Before going into business, she spent four years living on a sailboat and sailing the Caribbean.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

In this episode of Land Language, we sit down with Brittney Herrera, CEO of Thunder Egg and GeoTune. With 25 years in interior architecture for Fortune 500 tech companies, Brittney has spent her career designing spaces where people want to be. Over time, she found the layer beneath the built environment that most designers never look at: the energetic condition of the land itself. We discuss geopathic stress, how it shows up in dead trees, struggling businesses, flooding basements, broken equipment, and what ancient practices like copper-rod tuning can do about it.

CHAPTERS:

00:00 Start

00:33 Meet Brittany Herrera

01:15 Magnetic Workspaces

01:56 What Is GeoTune

03:09 Origin Story and Proof

05:58 Hotel Case Study

08:35 Tuning Worldwide

10:28 On Site Process

12:07 Flooding Success Story

14:01 Skepticism and ROI

17:10 Trees and Relationship

25:35 Farms and Biodiversity

26:59 Tensor Ring Demo

28:14 How to Work Together

28:59 Closing Thoughts

Follow Brittney:

Website: https://www.brittneyherrera.com/

Geotune on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/geotune_energy

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

In this episode of Land Language, hosts Brit Sastrawidjaya and Bethany Rydmark sit down with Angelique Robb, founder of SYNKD, a media platform and event series connecting landscape architects, contractors, designers, and horticulturists. They dig into the communication failures that cost design-build-maintain projects their best outcomes, two materials most US practitioners haven't encountered, and why stormwater management belongs to anyone who calls themselves a landscape professional.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

00:34 Meet Angelique Robb

01:34 From Petroleum to Landscapes

09:41 Communication Makes Projects

15:20 SYNKD Connecting the Industry

18:10 Living Retaining Wall Innovation

26:33 Stormwater Is Landscaping

31:09 Permeable Paving Options

36:56 SYNKD Events and Community

39:36 Collaboration and Taking Action

43:56 Language Shapes the Land

48:48 Closing Thoughts

Follow Angelique:

Website: https://www.synkd.io/about-us

SYNKD on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/synkd_landscpae

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.

Jonathan Clay built The Kalos Project to close Houston's local food gap using permaculture design. The same principles guide how he leads his team.

In this episode of Land Language, hosts Brit Sastrawidjaya and Bethany Rydmark sit down with Jonathan and explore how permaculture's closed-loop principles translate to team leadership, what it takes to create a safe container for conflict on a job site, and the platform Jonathan is building to transform Houston's local food economy.

Chapters:

00:00 Start

00:34 Meet Jonathan Clay

04:05 Handling Conflict On Teams

07:37 Boundaries And Timing

10:19 Making Space For Quiet Voices

16:50 Permaculture As Leadership

21:05 Team Goals And KPIs

25:59 Right Fit For The Role

28:14 Ground Zero Resources

29:06 Profitability Not Woo Woo

31:44 Why Kalos Project

33:02 Volunteer Powered Food Hubs

35:16 How To Follow Kalos

35:57 Closing Thoughts

References:

- The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz

- The Surrender Experiment by Michael A. Singer

Follow Jonathan:

Website: https://kalosproject.earth/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kalosproject.earth

Follow Land Language:

Land Language Website: https://www.landlanguage.org/

Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelandlanguage/

Connect with Us:

Got questions? Ideas for future guests? DM us on Instagram or visit our website to share your thoughts. We're building this together.

About Land Language:

Land Language is a podcast for landscape professionals, plant lovers, and anyone who wants to understand what it really takes to build regeneratively. Hosted by contractor/designer Brit Sastrawidjaya and designer Bethany Rydmark, each episode brings you expert insights, practical tools, and honest conversations about transforming the landscape industry from the ground up.