BLOOMING INSPIRATION
Self-guided tour offers a look at six Corrales home gardens
Get inspired and admire gardens at six Corrales homes during the ninth annual Corrales Garden Tour.
The self-guided tour features unique gardens. Participants change each year, and with the exception of one home, which was featured about eight years ago, it is the first time on the tour for the other homes.
“Corrales gardens they are all very different,” said Nancy Renner, promotions chairwoman of Corrales Garden Tour. “One is a kind of a minimalistic garden that’s relatively new. I think it’s been in about three years, but it’s a very contemporary house and contemporary garden with raised beds, interesting shrubbery. They’ve got different ornamental trees as well as fruit trees and a vegetable garden that’s in a raised bed to keep our friendly little rabbits out.”
Another home on the tour has a traditional New Mexico garden with winding paths lined with adobe bricks along the edge. Several other gardens featured have been brought back to life.
“When the people bought the house, the garden had really kind of gone to pot, and the owners have rejuvenated it and made it a stunning xeric garden,” Renner said. “And the other one that I think is really fascinating, actually there are two, but one is right by the bosque and you would never believe you were in Corrales. It has waterfalls. It has streams. It has a lot of grass. And it’s a very mature garden. It’s really more like an estate almost.”
A garden in Corrales’ sand hills was created by its owner using hundreds of tons of rock to create pathways, walls and display areas to showcase native plants, which provides an “amazing” contrast, according to Renner.
In most cases, the homeowners will be available and Sandoval County Master Gardeners will be on hand to answer questions eventgoers might have about their own gardens or questions about something they are seeing in the garden they are visiting.
“It’s good for people who are beginner gardeners, as well as very experienced ones, because they will be able to see many different types of things and good examples of things that they may want to try at their home,” Renner said.
The garden tour is a fundraiser for Corrales MainStreet. Corrales MainStreet is part of a national historic trust, and the goal is economic development as well historic preservation in the village, according to Renner.
“So part of the funds of the tour are being gathered to be able to do landscaping throughout Corrales and attract businesses,” she said. “Ever since the beginning, that’s always been our goal. And we want to bring people into the village to see Corrales and see the businesses that are here. That’s part of our economic development efforts. Have lunch at the restaurants. Outdoor seating is available at all of them. Some are open for breakfast. The growers market also. There is a number of things that we would like people to see as well as the gardens.”