The conservatory at Stonecrop Gardens in Cold Spring, New York—a stop on the way home to Pennsylvania.
My readers were inspired by my last post on the beautiful, flower-filled garden of Charles Cresson, which I visited in May of 2014. To see the lovely photos, click here. It was fun to revisit a sunny garden during what seems like a winter that will never end. We have now had three warm days so spring is on its way. But snow still covers the ground, and I thought everyone could use another dose of sun and flowers.
Nursery News: Carolyn’s Shade Gardens is a retail nursery located in Bryn Mawr, PA, specializing in showy, colorful, and unusual plants for shade. The only plants that we ship are snowdrops and miniature hostas. For catalogues and announcements of events, please send your full name, location, and phone number (for back up use only) to carolyn@carolynsshadegardens.com. Click here to get to the home page of our website for catalogues and information about our nursery and to subscribe to our blog.
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Our headquarters for our Connecticut trip was the beautiful Hidden Valley Bed and Breakfast in Washington Depot, CT.
In the third week of June, a friend and I traveled to the northwestern corner of Connecticut to attend The Garden Conservancy’s Litchfield County Open Day. The Litchfield area is a gorgeous part of the U.S. with historic New England towns, classic farms surrounded by stone walls, and wooded hills and valleys running through sparsely populated countryside. Just driving around the area is a pleasure.
The Garden Conservancy sponsored a tour to seven area gardens to finance their “mission to save and share outstanding American gardens for the education and inspiration of the public.” Here are a few of the hundreds of photos I took during the tour. Enjoy!
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Link Garden: A pool with a sophisticated, screened pool house perches on the side of the Connecticut hills.
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Link Garden: ligularia, hosta, and ferns in a shady corner.
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Link Garden: Aiming for ease of maintenance as the owners age, the perennial garden was replaced by this stylized rill.
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Link Garden: another shady nook behind the house.
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Brush Hill Gardens: In addition to this large and beautiful English cottage garden, there was an extensively planted woodland with several ponds, but the lighting wasn’t good for photos.
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Brush Hill Gardens
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Williams Garden: A Greek Revival pool house is not for everyone, but it was interesting to see it.
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Williams Garden: The pool edged with 18th century French coping was quite elegant.
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Williams Garden: an extensive kitchen garden and elaborate “garden shed”.
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Williams Garden: stone trough filled to overflowing with succulents.
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Trapp Garden: a little bit of Italy in West Cornwall, Connecticut.
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Trapp Garden: A very secluded pool on the side of a terrace with a grotto-like pool house sunk in the side of a hill. I usually think pools detract from the landscape but changed my mind on this tour.
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Trapp Garden
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Highmeadows: Beautiful use of our native goatsbeard, I am not sure why more gardeners don’t grow this.
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Highmeadows
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Highmeadows
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Highmeadows: The roses growing on the soft-colored walls were breath-taking.
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Hollister House Garden: This was my favorite. The garden is a Garden Conservancy preservation project and surrounds an historic Connecticut farmhouse. It is divided into a series of rooms and vistas by tall hedges and walls. The plant choices are enchanting, and the color combinations are gorgeous. The garden is open to the public every Saturday from June through September. For more information, click here.
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Hollister House Garden
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Hollister House Garden
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Hollister House Garden
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Hollister House Garden
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Hollister House Garden
The sun is shining and it’s going to be 60 degrees F today so all the snow and ice is bound to melt shortly.
Carolyn
Nursery Happenings: Due to rescheduling, spaces have opened up in Charles Cresson’s seminar The Winter Garden in Bloom. For details, click here. Our first event is the Hellebore Extravaganza on Saturday, April 11, from 10 am to 3 pm. However, you can stop by anytime by appointment to purchase hellebores. To access the 2015 Snowdrop Catalogue, please click here.
Carolyn’s Shade Gardens is a local retail nursery in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, U.S., zone 6b/7a. The only plants that we mail order are snowdrops and miniature hostas and only within the US.
If you are within visiting distance and would like to receive catalogues and information about customer events, please send your full name and phone number to carolynsshadegardens@verizon.net. Subscribing to my blog does not sign you up to receive this information.
Facebook: Carolyn’s Shade Gardens has a Facebook Page where I post single photos, garden tips, and other information that doesn’t fit into a blog post. You can look at my Facebook page here or click the Like button on my right sidebar here.
Notes: Every word that appears in orange on my blog is a link that you can click for more information. If you want to return to my blog’s homepage to access the sidebar information (catalogues, previous articles, etc.) or to subscribe to my blog, just click here.
CAROLYN'S SHADE GARDENS 