AJ Morales

GARDEN DESIGNER

AJ is one of those rare cases who parlayed a high school summer job into a lifelong passion. A Miami native, AJ worked summers and weekends doing landscaping for his uncle’s company. In the grueling South Florida heat, AJ did the grunt work of maintenance and installation. AJ enjoyed the work, but he had been taught to go to college, get a job with an office, wear a tie to work, and call it a day.  Little did he know that while he was planting in other people’s gardens, he was watering the seeds of his true calling…

Upon graduating from the University of Central Florida with a Bachelor of Science in Marketing, AJ dove right into Corporate America. Putting his degree to good use, he designed and executed direct marketing campaigns for some of the most respected brands such as American Express, Office Depot, Carnival Cruise Lines, Club Med, and Royal Caribbean. AJ quickly rose the ranks and positioned himself in the echelons of upper management.

But, AJ never forgot the thrill he got from building someone’s yard. In 2006, at the request of family and friends, he agreed to design gardens as a hobby.  AJ designed their yards with plants and material that he began to love and watched their lawns grow into something special. It didn’t take long before this growing hobby bloomed into something much more substantial. His designs were so well-received by those closest around him that they started to refer him to their friends. The work started to pour in, and this prompted him into launching Plant One Seed in 2011.

Plant One Seed became his passion project. A self-described “landscaping geek”, AJ had to make a decision:  stick it out in his office wearing a suit and tie, or revert to the 16-year-old passionate kid who truly loved what he did. The rest is history.

AJ partnered with his high-school friend, Alex Cazo, and is now one of the premier landscape designers in South Florida. When he’s not scouring local farms to find his clients the best plants to install in their yards, AJ hits the beach and surfs, coaches his son’s sports teams, does a bit of fishing, hangs with the wife and children, and retrieves his terrier, Bob, from the neighbor’s back yard.

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