Our guiding principle at Peruse is to create gardens with artistic composition of both looking upon and observing from within, harnessing the innumerable and complex design factors for a beautiful, well-functioning, exterior space that will thrive over time.
Peruse approaches every project foremost with our client’s needs and preferences while drawing from historical design principles. We apply a rigorous creative process to develop into a fully realized environment from concept to construction, installation and aftercare.
We believe in an old-world approach to garden design. The meticulously sourced masonry, the excavated mature hero tree and the humble shrub are treated in equal measure as to how it will endure and transform in the generations to come. We nurture the sensory experience of nature with filtered sunlight, fragrance and sound that are pursued with careful consideration of the surrounding architecture and ecosystem, always ushering elements like the use of water, soil nutrition and pollination in our quest of responsible stewardship of our client’s land. We are only custodians of nature, after all.
Peruse was founded in 2018 by Mintee Kalra and Patrick Lord. We are a family-owned boutique practice located in Los Angeles.
Mintee’s love of horticulture began during her childhood in the Bay Area, nurtured by regular trips to the nearby Redwood preserves and national and state parks. She went on to have over 25 years of experience in design, first in fashion designing for several high-profile fashion brands. Her work featured in Vogue, Italian Vogue, British Vogue, Vanity Fair, Savage Beauty: Alexander McQueen Retrospective and WWD. Mintee’s fashion career informed her archival approach to references, color stories and texture. She draws inspiration from her time working in London, Paris, Milan, Florence, New Delhi, New York and Los Angeles. During her travels, she experienced a multitude of approaches to garden and landscape design, which kindled her love of a poetic and architectural aesthetic. Mintee then immersed herself in botany, studying horticulture at UCLA. She also holds design degrees from Central Saint Martins, London College of Fashion and University of Westminster.
Patrick grew up in southern California, and regularly spent time with his grandfather, Richard McWhorter, in Hancock Park. His grandfather’s career in film, working with luminaries such as Frank Capra and Cecil B. DeMille, would become a profound influence on Patrick and the foundation for his passion for product design. Patrick is a self-taught furniture designer and woodworker. His designs echo the utilitarian ease of the Brutalist and Bauhaus movements, and his technique values manual skills over expedience. His custom designs are regularly featured in our projects. After becoming a licensed CPA, Patrick worked in acquisitions for developer Crescent Heights and VCA animal hospitals, as well as on the senior management finance and accounting teams for Golden Road Brewing and ThinkThin products. Patrick has a degree in Business from Cal State Fullerton.