About DeLorenzo International

DeLorenzo International, Inc. opened their doors for business on October 1, 2011.  With a main office in the heart of Little Italy, it is  a small employee owned business specializing in landscape architecture, land planning, master planning for communities and parks and recreation, consulting services that range from land development/acquisition, traffic studies and traffic calming solutions, public/private ventures, and smart landscaping solutions for new and established landscapes that reduce maintenance cost from 50 percent or more. 

The firm’s projects include master planned communities, park and recreational facilities such as extreme sports parks, skate parks and aquatic complexes, regional parks, and bicycle, hiking/pedestrian trails and transit related projects such as the I-125 Corridor and SR-56.  They also provide landscape architectural designs for high-end community centers and rec centers, private homes, and affordable housing, enhanced streetscapes, military faciities and educational and institutional campuses. 

The principals of the firm have worked on a variety of project types including: urban streetscape designs and mixed-use projects; streetscape enhancements, transit facilities such as the Orange Line Depot Trolley stop and bridge studies, and the award-winning Washington & Goldfinch street enhancement. They also specialize in green design and in 2009 teamed with Paladino & Company to produce the CCDC San Diego Green Street Program now being adopted city-wide and that won the “Innovation in Green Community Planning Award” in October of 2011.

Staff Specialities

President of the firm, Nick DeLorenzo, has been producing individualized long-term landscape programs for water-hungry corporate and institutional campuses for over 20 years transforming them into beautiful but sustainable landscapes and providing a savings of  50 percent or more in maintenance cost, all with the least amount of plant removal or visual disruption.  He owned his own firm for over 20 years and has a working history with some of DeLorenzo International’s staff  that spans 10 to 30 years. He is an adjucnt faculty member teaching advanced landscape design at Cuyamaca Community College and a regular speaker on sustainability as well as being published in California Parks & Recreation Magazine on pruning and maintenance techniques to reduce water-use, pruning, green waste and overall maintenance cost.

Michael Spohr, principal, licensed landscape architect ASLA, LEED AP certified, has known and worked with Nick for 30 years.  As well as being a landscape architect, he developed a specialty in writing comprehensive design guidelines and smart landscape master plans.  On military facilities along the west coast his award-winning comprehensive design guidelines are consulted before any reconstruction, development or landscape rehabilitation are conducted or implemented.  His attention to detail also makes him the perfect quality control professional whose expertise moves our client’s projects quickly through the permitting and review process.

Principal and licensed landscape architect Michelle M. Landis is a licensed landscape architect, ASLA and adjunct faculty member of Southwestern College teaching landscape architecture and regional sustainability with a focus on sensitive coastal development.  She has also developed a specialty in habitat restoration and rehabilitation and invasive species removal.  A former independent contractor for the California Department of Fish and Game, she served on the SDASLA Sustainability Stewardship Committee and as a SANDAG Stakeholder Representative for “Quality of Life Measure”

Chief Operating Officer, Joseph A. Contreras, specializes in construction cost analysis, having worked in this industry for over 20 years and with the DeLorenzo International team for nearly 15 years.  Mr. Contreras works to develop databases for cost estimating and in-house irrigation central-control water-management systems, which include CalSense, Hunter, and Tucor.  He is an invaluable advisor in financial and management issues, As a MCSE, he also serves as the firm’s IT, GIS, and CADD support technician.   

His expertise in cost analysis, water management, and technical systems is vital to DeLorenzo International’s project management and is second to none. 

DeLorenzo International has satellite offices in Portland, Oregon with Nick’s brother and graphic artist, Christopher DeLorenzo, his daughter Maria DeLorenzo with Nelson Nygard, a national transportation and sustainanable urban design firm in San Francisco, and plans are in the works for establishing a satellite office in of Mexico south of Puerto Vallarta.