My Sunken Summer House Garden in Spring
Did you see my Instagram page @MarthaStewart48? The sunken garden behind my Summer House is filled with spring growth.
I began this formal garden more than 10 years ago and have added many different kinds of plants and trees ever since. It is a kind of room walled by a tall hedge of boxwood. The focal point is the great old ginkgo tree at the back of the space that was original to the property. Here, I've planted both American and English boxwood, smaller ginkgo trees, smoke bushes, Siberian weeping pea shrubs, peonies, hostas, lilies, Leucojum vernum or spring snowflakes, Heuchera, and so much more. I am so pleased with how well it has grown.
Here are some photos of this beautiful garden taken this week, enjoy.
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- The former owner of my farm, Mrs. Sharp, occupied two houses on the property. She called this the Summer House, where she stayed during warm weather. Adjacent to it is the Winter House which had a better heating system and where Mrs. Sharp was comfortable during the colder season. Today, the Summer House is used both as a library and as a place for entertaining. And out back is this beautiful sunken garden.
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- Here is a view from the Summer House terrace. When I first designed this garden, I called it my Boxwood Room. It measures 60 by 120 feet. The garden’s focal point is the old Ginkgo tree at the back of the garden.
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- Most of the garden is surrounded by a tall American boxwood hedge. And because the Summer House faces a rather busy intersection, the wall of boxwood provides a good deal of privacy.
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- The smaller ginkgo trees are planted along both sides of the footpath. The ginkgo biloba is one of the most distinct and beautiful of all deciduous trees. It prefers a minimum of four hours of direct, unfiltered sunlight each day. The ginkgo has a cone-like shape when young, and becomes irregularly rounded as it ages.
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- The ginkgo leaves are unusually fan-shaped, up to three-inches long, with a petiole that is also up to three-inches long. This shape and the elongated petiole cause the foliage to flutter in the slightest breeze. Ginkgo leaves grow and deepen color in summer, then turn a brilliant yellow in autumn.
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- This year, I placed metal green garden furniture on the terrace, so guests can sit, relax, and enjoy all the beautiful plantings in this garden.
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- On the terrace, I also have a collection of eight of these gorgeous faux bois containers I acquired a few years ago.
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- Inside this container is a Norfolk Island pine, Araucaria heterophylla. It is not an actual pine tree, but rather a relative of the monkey puzzle tree, and is often cultivated as a landscape tree in subtropical climates in North America. It features soft foliage, vibrant greenery, and easy-to-care-for growth.
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- This is the top view of a young sago palm – also in a faux bois planter. The sago palm, Cycas revoluta, is a popular plant known for its feathery foliage and ease of care. Native to the southern islands of Japan, the sago palm goes by several common names, including Japanese palm, funeral palm, king sago or just plain sago palm. The plant is not a true palm, despite its common name, but a cycad, part of a prehistoric class of plants. It produces a whorl of dark green, feather-like fronds on its trunk. The pinnate leaves are typically about four to five feet long at maturity, and nine-inches wide, reaching their greatest length when grown in partial shade.
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- In this garden, I also have six weeping Siberian pea shrubs, Caragana arborescens, with cascading weeping branches. These are hardy, sun-loving, large shrubs which are tolerant of drought, wind, deer, and varying soil conditions.
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- The pea shrubs bear pinnately compound light green leaves.
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- And small, delicate yellow pea-like flowers. Flowers are bright yellow, and about ¾ inch long.
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- The boxwood shrubs down the center of the garden are carefully groomed with tapered tops. Boxwood is naturally a round or oval shaped shrub that can reach up to 15 feet in height.
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- This bed is filled with Leucojum vernum – the spring snowflake, a perennial plant that grows between six to 10 inches in height and blooms heavily in early spring.
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- The plant produces green, linear leaves and white, bell-shaped flowers with a green edge and green dots. Don’t confuse them with Snowdrops. The Snowflake is a much taller growing bulb which normally has more than one flower per stem. Snowdrops have helicopter-like propellers that are green only on the inner petals.
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- Ipheion uniflorum, commonly called spring starflower, is native to Argentina and Uruguay and features grass-like foliage and solitary star-shaped flowers on six inch tall stems. Flowers range in color from almost white to violet blue. Flowers have a mild spicy fragrance, and the foliage when bruised emits an oniony aroma.
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- This trout lily is ‘Pagoda Dogtooth,’ It produces up to 10 clustered, 12-inch arching stems that bear yellow, nodding flowers with reflexed petals.
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- And it’s a bit of a tease, but soon the tree peonies will all be blooming. Tree peonies are larger, woody relatives of the common herbaceous peony, growing up to five feet wide and tall in about 10 years. They are highly prized for their large, prolific blooms that can grow up to 10 inches in diameter.
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- All the hostas are also growing quickly. Hostas are a perennial favorite among gardeners. Their lush green foliage varying in leaf shape, size and texture, and their easy care requirements make them ideal for many areas. Hosta is a genus of plants commonly known as hostas, plantain lilies and occasionally by the Japanese name, giboshi. They are native to northeast Asia and include hundreds of different cultivars.
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- Look at the giant leaves of this hosta.
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- This is Heuchera. The glossy dark maroon, almost black, leaves keep their color all season – it adds a gorgeous accent to the beds.
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- The ferns are looking so vibrant this time of year and they grow taller every day. These graceful perennials are easy to grow, long-lived, and require very little care. They come in a variety of leaf colors, shapes, and sizes. I have many, many ferns here at the farm.
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- At the end of the footpath is this antique sundial. A sundial is any device that uses the sun’s altitude or azimuth to show the time. It consists of a flat plate, which is the dial, and a gnomon, which casts a shadow onto the dial.
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- Cotinus, also known as smoketree or smoke bush, is a genus of two species of flowering plants in the family Anacardiaceae, closely related to the sumacs. They are a great choice for massing or for hedges.
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- The stunning dark red-purple foliage turns scarlet in autumn and has plume-like seed clusters, which appear after the flowers and give a long-lasting, smoky haze to branch tips.
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- This is a view from the side entrance into the garden. Straight ahead is the tall American boxwood hedge that surrounds this area on three sides. Here, one can also see the low manicured boxwood hedges that provide the framing for the garden beds. I love this formal garden – it’s looking more lush every year.
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