There is a big difference if it is a new landscape or a rehab. If it is new, the closer it is to complete, the less you need to worry about variables that you are going to have to address. If it is a house under construction, you have to try and find out exactly what is going to be completed by others. Such things as decks, steps, walkways, driveways, AC condensers, outdoor showers, drywells, and such may or may not be built yet, or may not be completely thought out yet. You need to know where these are going, or if you can influence them or design them. You also need to know how much excavating and rough grading is going to be done before you are responsible for grading and drainage. It makes a huge difference if you are hired through the builder, or directly by the home owner. If the builder hires you, you'll be expected to address his concerns with much greater importance than the aesthetics of the landscape. Scheduling and not making things that he has to adjust to will be important. You are more of a pawn to the builder. The good news is that he will have an interest in you getting your work done and not wrecking it. If you work for the homeowner, you can focus more on the design. You'll have a little more clout because if you can sell your ideas to the homeowner first the builder has to respond. This puts more responsibility on you as well. It also takes more confidence and you need to be more assertive if you are going to control this landscape. In either case, you have to understand that the builder is more worried about getting the house done as easily as possible than coordinating with you or accommodating you. The problem is that there is usually a date when the home owners need to get an occupancy permit. That date is always ASAP which means that the builder is going to be scrambling to finish things with lots of different subs as this date arrives. That means lots of trucks parking close to the house and more things being cut and prepared outside as the floors and paint are now finished inside. That makes it hard to work, or threatens work that you might have already done. The bigger the job, the more you have to avoid thinking about details first and the more you have to cocentrate on the big picture. In other words, it becomes more of a landscape design and less of a garden design. Rhythm and massing are much more important in helping to create unity. Where lots of variety works on smaller houses and smaller spaces, it becomes spotty and disjointed on larger homes or spaces. Trees become much more important features with big lots and big houses. Hardscapes layout and design, fences, lighting, and irrigation may all be things you are expected to address and coordinate which may or may not be what you are used to.

On the coping there is not much you can do to improve it. Since it varies in thickness there is nothing you can do to make it look better. Nature of the beast when you are dealing with natural stone. On the stacked stone they could have cut each piece to fit unless you are going for the grouted look in between the individual pieces of stone. If you were going for that the least they could have done is butt the stone under the flagstone coping so you don't have a big ugly grout joint there. I don't know if it is worth pulling it all out and redoing it but it would not pass muster with the customers in my area.

"If you sound crazy, his potential customers will feel sorry for him, not you." I doubt it. A sloppy contractor is enough to drive anyone crazy." jellytoast: Don't ever doubt it. I've shown up for jobs and had customers say "I read your reviews. What's with the lady with the caulk?" I just shrug my shoulders, roll my eyes, and get to work without saying a word. Customers are much more sophisticated than many contractors give them credit for being. They worry to death about a poor review and shouldn't. I wouldn't remove a single poor review I have; they are pure gold as far as credibility. The customers I want have a fully operational kook detector.

I would use white caulk in the corners, not gray. This is because the tile layout should look like the tiles bend around the corners. i.e., half a tile on either side of the corner, or 1/4 on one side and 3/4 on the other side. So a contrasting caulk would cut the tile visually and eliminate the illusion of the bending tile. Also, always caulk, not grout, when you have changes of plane. Finally, as others mentioned, you should not have slivers of tile on the ends or corners. You fix this by shifting the tiles. So on the RH side (I assume this is your first photo), the pattern should be shifted 1/2" to the left, so that in the corner you have full tiles or half tiles, every other row. Then on the left corner the tiles will all be pushed down 1/2" so that the wrapped around portion that's now about 1" becomes 1 1/2" wide.