With decades of combined experience, Catherine and Paul offer unique skill sets and ideas while bringing compelling solutions to every design challenge.
Catherine’s expertise in horticulture brings insightfulness brimming with artistry to installations, while Paul’s inquisitive worldview layers in a constant search for beauty and spatial harmony. When joined together, the partners’ talents and skills both ground and elevate each project.
Just as art and science function best together, The Outside Design Studio’s work combines extensive knowledge with a passion for bringing together the natural world with human experience.
Catherine Trudeau
With more than 15 years of experience designing landscapes, Catherine Trudeau blends artistry and horticulture while working closely with the unique needs of homeowners, builders, and developers to transform outdoor spaces.
Driven by her innate love for plant life, Catherine dedicated her early career to residential landscape and retail, and later earned her Masters of Landscape Architecture degree from the College of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Paul Blanding
Paul Blanding is passionate about many things, including but not limited to: the way things work, what makes spaces comfortable, how art evolves, why music matters, how myths shape humanity, where ideas lead, and how children learn.
Paul has been designing landscapes for more than 15 years, also earning his Masters of Landscape Architecture at IIT. Prior to forming The Outside Design Studio with Catherine, Paul specialized in commercial and residential landscape design, where he worked on public plazas in downtown Chicago, private gardens in Hawaii, airports in the UAE, and many others.