The Garden Conservancy has scheduled a full day of private garden openings on Sunday, July 25, from 10 – 4, in Washington, Connecticut.  Please note that two of the gardens will be open from noon to four only.  For complete details, log on to www.gardenconservancy.org.  Tickets are not necessary – there is a $5 entrance fee per garden.

Red Mill Farm, Washington, Connecticut

Informal gardens set off an 1840s farmhouse and historic pre-Revolutionary War sawmill. Intimate spaces on changing levels around the house and conservatory, paved with local granite, feature tropical and half-hardy container plants and vines along with roses and perennials. A white garden with flagstone paving filled with plants is surrounded by trellises with roses and clematis. Sweeping lawns drop to the sawmill area, where native plants, wildflowers, and a wet garden border the millpond and waterways. Amble through a new woodland area with its rocky pool.

Ridge Field, 49 Painter Ridge Road, Washington, Connecticut

After gardening for more than twenty years around a modernist house in dark oak woods on a steep hillside, we migrated to a gambrel-roofed cottage adjacent a bright blue swimming pool surrounded by a ranch-style fence in the middle of a hayfield! Sun? Check. Flat? Check. Now what? JUST KEEP IT MANAGEABLE!! Twelve years later, a series of garden spaces and borders frame the toned-down pool. They are anchored by select trees and shrubs for year-round interest from nearby windows and are enclosed with a “birds lunch” hedgerow. A small, mixed orchard of berries and fruits and a vegetable patch (now rampant with foxgloves and hollyhocks) have pushed out into the hayfield. This garden has appeared in various magazines.

Hollister House Garden, 300 Nettleton Hollow Road, Washington, Connecticut

This is an old-fashioned, but unusual, rambling formal garden informally planted with an exuberant abundance of both common and exotic plants in subtle, and sometimes surprising, color combinations. High walls and hedges divide separate rooms and open to create interesting vistas out towards the landscape. Recent expansion of the garden has been completed with other areas being revised.  See picture below.

Directions:
From I-84, take Exit 15/Southbury. Take Route 6 north through Southbury and Woodbury. Turn left onto Route 47 North. Go 4 miles, past Woodbury Ski Area on left, and turn right onto Nettleton Hollow Road. Go 1.7 miles. Garden is on right. Please park along road.

Ron & Nancy Chute, 8 Kirby Road, Washington, Connecticut (Please Note: This garden is open from 12 – 4 only)

Our 1774 house faces Washington’s Green. Behind it, you will find a serene, private space with mature trees, a long lawn framed with boxwood, stone walls, and woodland plantings. This was created on L-shaped, sloping land after years of benign neglect. The owners, who maintain the property themselves,  leveled the lawn and planted the slopes with tapestries of shrubs and perennials. Tall, tightly pruned hollies screen the rear terrace, and the adjoining cow-shed foundation is now a parterre garden with cast-iron fountain. A cucumber magnolia and other large trees shelter shade-loving collectibles.

Directions:
The Chute and Thomson gardens are located near Washington Congregational Church, where Wykeham Road and Kirby Road join Route 47. Parking is available on Kirby Road and in parking lot of Gunn Library, off Wykeham.
From Route 47 north past intersection of Route 199, turn right onto Wykeham to park at Gunn Library. Or, continue on Route 47 behind church and turn left onto Kirby Road to park there.
From Nettleton Hollow, go north to Wykeham Road. Turn left and continue to library parking lot on left just before intersection with Route 47. Or, turn right on Route 47 and then left on Kirby Road just past church.
The address of Chute house is 8 Kirby Road, but the house faces Green. Park along Kirby Road and walk down sidewalk along Green to second house (Chute’s). Enter garden via a narrow passage between first and second house, marked by a red Japanese maple and an old well cover.
Please park along Green and in front of Congregational Church, but not in front of Parish House.

Orchard Terrace, 2 Old North Road, Washington, Connecticut (Please Note: this garden is open from 12 – 4 only)

Orchard Terrace, designed by Erick Rossiter in 1898, is situated on a former apple orchard and overlooks the playing fields of the Gunnery. The garden is a work in progress; much of it created over the last five years. The property is speckled with rock outcroppings amongst which perennial gardens are planted. A pool and greenhouse have been added to showcase tropical plants and orchids as well as native plants and grasses. An effort has been made to provide a natural habitat for butterflies, birds, and other wildlife.

Directions:
Please walk across Green from Nancy Chute’s garden. Or, park in lower part of Gunn Library at Wykeham Road. Walk down Wykeham Road to Old North Road (about 100 yards), which is on left. The garden is first driveway on right. Do not attempt to park at house; parking will only be allowed on Green or at library.