MUD, SWEAT & TEARS
This Laura Ashley works with real flowers, and got married in her garden
Laura Ashley’s Victorian home and surrounding gardens in Crafton are so serene and in sync that they appear to have been that way since the late 1800s. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Ms. Ashley’s astonishing work on both the house and garden made her a co-winner in the small category of the Great Gardens Contest, which is judged by staffers of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Pittsburgh Botanic Garden.
While she grew up in a North Hills home built in the 1970s, her first glimpse of this house brought back a flood of childhood memories.
“My house looks a lot like a dollhouse that my grandfather and uncle built for me as a child,” she says. “The real estate agent forewarned me that it was much more historical looking on the outside than the inside — very true! — but I felt an instant connection to the house.”
Undeterred, she purchased it and moved in in 2006, at first living in the third-floor apartment. Tackling both the house and garden took a herculean effort, but she had a vision.
“I started ripping out the bushes that hid the house and then started planting some foundational plants. I knew it was important to amend the soil, so I spent a bit of my time and money shoveling in mushroom manure. I also started asking anyone I knew or met about plant suggestions and for advice!”
The garden today is chock-full of lovely, well-grown plants, including zinnias, snapdragons, mandevilla, passion vine, clematis, asters, mums, David Austin roses, cannas, celosia, salvia, calla lilies, coneflowers, delphiniums, iris, rudbeckia and peonies. Colors run riot here, especially orange, her favorite.
She planted arborvitae as screening and a “fence” of hornbeams and hydrangeas. Specimen trees include a ‘Dancing Peacock’ Japanese maple, Hinoki cypress, Japanese stewartia and weeping redbud. Dinner platesize dahlias pop up here and there in the beds as vertical exclamation points, raising their lovely round heads toward the sun.
“Like the Victorians, I like to include a combination of annuals and tropical plants,” Ms. Ashley says.
“I also learned early on to think about four seasons of interest. The garden would be so colorful and then winter would come. So, I started adding evergreens, winterberries and trees with interesting colored or textured bark.”
She has installed brick walkways and a lovely patio in the rear, accented with delightful ornaments and potted plants. Most come inside for the winter.
She says her garden connects her with friends and family.
“My mom gave me a gift by teaching me about plants and growing them . ... She died a few years ago, and when a plant she gave me blooms, I know it’s another gift from her.”
Recently, she got married in the garden, and one of her
wedding gifts was another Japanese maple. Other plants given to her by friends serve as constant reminders of the givers. The garden is a colorful living patchwork of memories
Her new husband, Greg Freehling, was originally not much of a gardener, she says. “But, over the last few years, he’s caught the gardening bug . ... He’s also taken an interest in dahlias, which was particularly helpful this year since most of them ended up being taller than me.” (She’s 5-foot-1.)
Her garden today draws praise from passers-by and her neighbors, but it’s clearly so much more than a showpiece for Ms. Ashley.
“Gardening for me is all about joy! I hope that people take away the fun you can have. Gardens don’t need to be serious or perfectly manicured to be beautiful. And, most of all, they don’t have to look the same as everyone else’s.
“Plant things that you like, not just what’s popular. Don’t be afraid of messing up, and don’t give up if something dies. Try again and then celebrate your success! And then, when it gets in your blood, share your experience with others!”