With a background in business and integrated marketing communications, Phil’s responsibilities range from general management duties to marketing, strategic planning and new business ventures at CSG. He developed his interest in gardens and design early in life and re-discovered it in the mid-90s when CSG was born. The intervening years spent in business nurtured in him a fascination with specialization and niche markets, which CSG now actively pursues.
As interest has grown in sustainable design and building practices, urban beautification and environmental awareness, CSG has ventured further into the realm of rooftop garden design and build services. The environmental benefits of such gardens, coupled with the innate appeal of a living, green garden space atop the city, have led Phil to believe there is a huge future for the company in rooftop garden work in addition to its longstanding landscape design work.
Phil's interests outside of work include distance running, vegetable gardening, cooking, poker, reading, billiards, and music of many varieties. He regularly attends the South By Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas each spring.
Sean first came to CSG in 2006 as a recent grad from the University of Illinois. At that time he was supporting the company’s design team in site layout, design development and project management, while generating his own design work. An opportunity arose in 2007 he couldn’t resist, and he spent the intervening 2 years in Sales and Project Management at a large suburban landscape design firm. Now Sean has returned to CSG in 2010 to bring the totality of his experiences to bear on the urban landscape.
After graduating from U of I, Sean spent a semester doing postgraduate work in residential design at the Oxford College of Garden Design in Oxford, England. He has traveled widely, taught (most recently at the Chicago Botanic Garden and Northwestern University’s School of Continuing Studies) and continues to explore new concepts in landscape design; sustainability; urban architecture and culture. When Sean is not designing something magnificent his focus is mainly on food and travel.
James Vinyard not only has a memorable name, he also has some memorable experiences. He has traveled widely throughout Canada and the US in his occupation as Project Manager on surveying and construction projects large and small. He spent a number of years as owner of his own commercial property surveying company, which took him to places as varied as the Hard Rock Casino in Las Vegas (he didn’t leave the casino for 2 weeks!) and a county morgue. He has held positions with both high-end residential developers and boutique metal fabrication shops. He has roots in Thailand, attended school in Arkansas, lives in Chicago and travels to Mesa, Arizona for Cubs spring training. Truly well-traveled.
As Construction Manager at CSG James’ responsibilities broadly cover the entire process of taking our designs from drawings through completion for our clients. So you can catch James at any particular time in a rooftop garden, at our shop, office or yard, with a supplier or breaking down a particularly complex challenge for our crews. Not as much fun as Vegas, perhaps. But not as expensive either.
James likes to train for triathlons in his spare time.
