Monday, January 7, 2013

A botanist's garden



Botanist Dan Hinkley, who founded the horticulturally famous Heronswood Nursery and Gardens in 1987, has discovered many beautiful plant species all over the world. Windcliff (above and below) is the wild and exuberant garden he started a decade ago at his home on a cliff-edged promontory above Washington State's Puget Sound.

This stunning garden, rarely seen, is featured in the paper pages of the January issue of Martha Stewart Living, on newsstands now.

Real gardens, on real paper (maybe I should copyright that?)...


(Heronswood, essentially a niche nursery, and which was taken over by W. Atlee Burpee and Co. in 2000, failed as a 'big' business and its once-beautiful gardens had been neglected for years. It has now been sold to the S'Klallam  tribe, who will restore the gardens that Dan Hinkley and his partner, architect Robert Jones, designed. Windcliff will donate plants to help the restoration process. There is an interesting interview on Garden Rant with Burpee CEO George Ball, known in gardening circles as the Wrecking Ball. And to really fill in the drama, here's a New York Times article about the closing of Heronswood.)

Now go and buy Martha to see the gardens at Windcliff!

Photos by Peden + Munk. Courtesy of Martha Stewart Living magazine. Copyright © 2013.

3 comments:

  1. I have a pink wisteria I bought from Heronswood Nursery ten years ago. It took a few years, but finally bloomed. It's my favorite plant in my very disheveled front 'garden'.

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  2. I will have to get that issue at some point... Glad that the gardens will be restored. Some of my favorite plants in the family garden originally came from Heronswood and have been moved and multiplied as my parents moved house and as I have been expanding the new garden.

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  3. That was fascinating. Clicking through all the links and then more links and reading all the back and forth. Sounded like a rashomon effect. But going to the site of the S'Klallam tribe I found the facebook page and lots of pixs. https://www.facebook.com/Heronswood. Thanks for such an interesting couple of hours.

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