VAA Garden Tour 2012 - June 23-24
June 23-24, 10 am – 5 pm
Tickets $20 (thru May 31/then $25) available at VAA, Heron’s Nest,
Vashon Bookshop, Kathy’s Corner and
www.brownpapertickets.com
Spring is here and so is the 22nd Annual Vashon Island Garden
Tour, one of Vashon Allied Arts’ biggest events of the year.
Weekend festivities begin with the Sunset Garden Gala, Friday, June
22, 6 pm until sunset in the private waterfront garden paradise of
Hans and Cindy Koch. Enjoy cocktails, gourmet dinner catered by The
Hardware Store Restaurant and live entertainment. Tickets are $125
per person and are limited. Call 463.5131 to reserve.
The Tour, slated for Saturday, June 23, and Sunday, June 24, offers
gardeners of all persuasions the opportunity to experience five
gorgeous outdoor Island sanctuaries. Explore five eclectic gardens
with magical features to delight the senses. Surround yourself with
the quiet energy of a healing garden sanctuary as you walk acres of
sheltering woods. Metal sculpture, a pergola and leaf swing provide
grace notes for this meditative refuge. Explore a woodland meadow
filled with purple lupine, Himalayan birch, poplar and maples.
Elegant boxwoods surround bluestone patios framing rhodies, davidii,
hydrangeas and lilacs in this inviting landscape. Take in an
intoxicating pond and waterfall; stroll gardens accented with
sculptures, antique Indonesian garden shed and numerous unusual
plants. Marvel how home and garden architecture meld with extended
pergolas deconstructing into meadows to create a palette of texture
and color. Lose yourself in an enchanting, fun-loving garden filled
with wondrous exotic plants and garden art complete with chicken
museum and palace stocked with outlandishly colored birds.
Tour tickets include expanded daily seminars. Learn how to select
and install stonework with Jan Nielsen, long-time Islander and
Marenakos Stone Project Manager. Melissa Schafer, Certified
Professional Horticulturist and owner of Schafer Specialty Landscape
& Design, will share secrets to fantastic container creations.
Discover the unique process of distilling essential oils with the
Lavender Sisters, handcrafters of fine organic lavender products
from Island grown lavender.
Stroll the gardens, enjoy live music and pick up a piece of original
garden art. And don’t miss Garden Art Market conveniently located on
Vashon Hwy. on the K2 building lawn! Tour tickets, valid both days,
are discounted until May 31; group rates available. We regret that
all gardens may not be wheelchair accessible.
Included in your ticket price is an expanded offering of inspiring
seminars (more info below) and live music in the gardens, discounts
at local merchants and much more.
The Garden Art Marke, located on the front lawn of the K2 building
off Vashon Hwy, will be open to the public and feature art to liven
up outdoor spaces and other garden-themed products made by local
artists. Bid on artistically embellished garden ewers and enter the
raffle to win one of several fantastic garden-related items donated
by local merchants.
Tour tickets are $20 per person through May 31, $25 after June 1.
All Garden Tour proceeds benefit Vashon Allied Arts.
Special thanks to Garden Tour presenting sponsors: Puget Sound
Energy, Thriftway, John L. Scott, Island Home Center & Lumber and JR
Crawford
Planting Seeds Sponsors: The Hardware Store Restaurant, Palouse
Winery, DIG Floral & Garden, Giraffe, Kathy’s Corner, Vashon Island
Coffee Roasterie & Minglement, Country Store & Gardens and Colvos
Creek Nursery.
Garden Talk Schedule:
Saturday
11am - Jan Nielsen in the Carhart garden
11am - David Pfeiffer
11am - Sylvia Soholt
Noon - Dave Hunter in the Pearson garden
Noon - Barry Foster
1pm - Melissa Schafer in the Soholt garden
1pm - Whit Carhart
2pm - Leda Langley in the Foster garden
3pm - David Pfeiffer
Sunday
11am - Jonathon Morse in the Carhart garden
11am - David Pfeiffer
11am - Lavender Sister in the Soholt garden
Noon - Sara Van Fleet in the Pearson garden
Noon - Tom Conway in the Foster garden
1pm - Sylvia Soholt
1pm - Whit Carhart
2pm - Barry Foster
3pm - David Pfeiffer
Garden Talk Descriptions:
Spring is bursting out all over, and this year’s Garden Tour offers
more information than ever, thanks to seminar coordinator Melissa
Schafer. Schafer Specialty Landscape & Design and certified
professional horticulturist, she brings containers to life with
structure, texture and color. Learn secrets to fantastic container
creations, how to choose container styles, soil blends and plant
combinations. “A single container in the landscape provides a focal
element; grouping containers together, you can create a versatile
landscape extension with a condensed pallet of texture and color.”
Join Schafer Saturday, 1 pm, in the Soholt garden. One of her
containers will be included in the raffle.
Dave Hunter of Hunter’s Mason Bees, Crown Bees’ website and mason
bee product supplier, is working to change pollination methods for
North America’s future orchards. Hunter partners with 500 gardeners
(70 on Vashon) to raise mason bees to improve health of orchards,
gardens and overall landscape. Hear more at the Pearson garden
Saturday, noon.
Leda Langley is half of the husband/wife team behind Langley Fine
Gardens, a wholesale nursery that specializes in unique and rare
varieties of vegetables and annuals. Langley provides over 100
varieties of tomatoes, peppers and eggplants and custom salad greens
to retail nurseries and regional farmers’ markets. Langley discusses
“black” flowering varities including ‘Sooty’ dianthus, Scabiosa ‘Ace
of Spades’ and ‘Watchman’ hollyhock. Other favorites include
night-scented flowers, hummingbird attractors and rare Echium
pinninana, a 12’ tall biennial from the Canary Islands. Langley
talks Saturday, 2 pm, in the Foster/Fillinger garden. Plants may be
purchased at Garden Art Market.
After years of urban living, blogger Tom Conway
(www.tallcloverfarm.com) opted for country life. He moved to Vashon
and settled on four acres of possibilities. “Gardening has always
been a passion and constant in my life; there is joy to be found in
the blossom and the leaf.” When Conway’s not making compost,
plotting against Scotch broom and shooing deer, he’s blogging about
gardening, cooking and his two bulldogs. “As a fan of big bossy
flowers, I’m eager to share gardening tips for growing bodacious
blossoms that can’t be ignored.” Conway introduces “Grande Dames” of
the garden: lilies, peonies, dahlias and roses at the
Foster/Fillinger garden Sunday, noon.
Jonathan Morse’s gardening interests were cultivated as a youth.
“I’m living my dream; gardening on my family's land here on Vashon
has given me the opportunity to express my creativity without
limits.” He discusses where to seek inspiration for details to make
the garden a work of art. Identifying and discussing design details,
Morse leads Tour guests through Carhart’s garden Sunday, 11 am.
The Lavender Sisters; Merrilee Runyan, Dana Illo and Katy Jo Steward
have collectively farmed lavender and handcrafted lavender products
on Vashon for 13 years. They sell lavender bouquets, scented balms
and lotions to wholesale florists, Puget Sound Metropolitan Markets
and farmers’ markets. They share the distilling process used to
create organic lavender products Sunday, 11 am, in the Soholt
garden.
Surrounded by eight acres of river rock, quartzite, granite and
basalt, Jan Nielsen, Project Manager for Marenakos Stone,
understands stone as a versatile landscape design element used among
plantings, as pathways, retaining walls and sculptural art. He
discusses stone installations in the Carhart’s landscape and how to
select and install stone for projects, Saturday, 11 am.
Designing gardens with wildlife in mind means incorporating plants
and creating habitat to encourage a birds, pollinators and other
animals. Passionate gardener and wildlife enthusiast Sara Van Fleet
transformed her Vashon property into a wildlife oasis by providing
attractive flowers and berries, protective habitat for nesting birds
and animals and a thriving pond ecosystem. She explores components
to create wildlife-friendly landscapes in the Pearson garden,
Sunday, noon.
‘Gardening with Weeds’: Landscape Architect David Pfeiffer discusses
the importance of why a thoughtfully organized and structured garden
plan, along with proper plant choices, including ‘weeds,’ will
enhance the beauty and still retain order and balance in your
garden.
His own garden, a cultivated half-acre (of 15 acres) illustrates
this philosophy. Designed with distinct rooms for lounging and
dining, potager (fruit and vegetables), a formal fountain,
perennials, grasses and topiary boxwood, the architecture of the
garden and house is intimately connected in feel and function.
Highly sophisticated, but sturdily agrarian. Pfeiffer will discuss
how to incorporate these principles in your garden 11 am and 3 pm.
Garden hosts Sylvia Soholt, Barry Foster and Whit Carhart introduce
visitors to their garden and share design inspiration and features
that make their gardens unique. Hosts speak throughout both Tour
days.
SEE YOU AT GARDEN TOUR! For more information, please call VAA at 206.463.5131.
