Cottage garden on Grand Durand tour is a labour of love
If you live in the old city" of Hamilton, you've almost certainly seen Stephanie Marchese's delightful home and garden.
It's an 1894 worker's cottage on Charlton Avenue West, just a couple of driveways east of Queen Street, and drivers and passersby can't help but notice the sweet cottage with the bright yellow door. Stephanie has lived there for 21 years.
She adores her home and loves the neighbourhood, both of which are the focus of today's Grand Durand Garden Tour, which features 12 gardens and the homes they surround. Visitors don't get into the homes, but there has been an effort to draw attention to the magnificent and varied architecture and styles of homes in the old, historic district between Queen and James streets. The properties range from magnificent Italianate and Spanish Revival mansions to ... well, to workers' cottages.
People can purchase tickets today at Central Presbyterian Church, at Charlton and Caroline streets, from 9:30 a.m. until 2 p.m. Gardens are open until 4 p.m. Tickets are $30 and if purchased today are cash only. Refreshments and washrooms are available at the church. It's a self-guided tour (the ticket doubles as a map) and most of the gardens are within walking distance of each other.
Stephanie's cottage came to her in a case of serendipity - or karma or whatever works for you. She's a North End kid but had fallen in love with the Durand neighbourhood for its walkability, its closeness to the Locke Street shopping area, for its preservation of old homes and resistance to high-density development.
Around 2002, she and a friend went to an open house - of the home next door. It wasn't the home for her, she realized, but admired the cottage next door with the yellow door. (Yes, the door predates her.) She mentioned it was so adorable" and that was it - until a week later, when she drove past and saw a For Sale" sign on the front lawn. She arranged for a viewing, met the owners (with whom she still stays in touch), loved the house and went home to crunch numbers. Sadly, she realized, she just couldn't afford it.
Then, surprisingly, the sales agent called and asked what she had thought of the cottage. Stephanie gushed over it but said she couldn't make the numbers work. Well, said the agent, the owners want the cottage to have an owner who appreciates it and they would like to work with you to try to make it affordable. Longer story made short, they were able to make a deal.
Stephanie was - and remains - thrilled that this became her home. I have been happy from Day One in this house." The cottage is more spacious than the street view would suggest and what changes Stephanie has made - including an updated kitchen and removal of an interior wall - are in keeping with the age and style of the cottage.
There was really no back garden: A lovely old mulberry tree in a corner and an expanse of red crushed stone. There was a nice deck outside the kitchen door but not much more. A few years ago, she decided she wanted something that was a sanctuary. Something pretty to look at."
She found examples in books and magazines of what she envisaged for the garden (and consulted with her mother, who is the gardener in the family and who still helps out with deadheading and other garden puttering"). When she met with a landscape architect, she knew, in broad strokes, what she wanted.
The result is a calming garden, where splashes of floral colour play against foliage's shades and hues of green. There are day lilies and ferns, peonies and periwinkle, flowering dogwood above hostas, hydrangeas and the fleshy, succulent-like leaves of sedums. An inviting flagstone path leads from the foot of the deck through the garden to a side gate that opens onto a neighbouring alley.
She's had the deck rebuilt (the original aged out) and it's a sweet space for entertaining, with candles and atmospheric lights; 1890s brick on one side and an exceptionally lovely fence starting on the other. She told the builders she wanted the fence boards to run horizontally, rather than the standard up-and-down. They grumbled but did it and the result is a complete success. The fence has a slightly more modern feel to it and the boards lead the eye around the garden. Visitors on garden tours always take away ideas, and I suspect this horizontal fence will inspire some of them.
The front garden is bisected by a lovely stone path and each side of the garden mirrors the other. There are hydrangeas and weigela, yellow and blue baptisia (false indigo), lavender and sedums and lilacs and mock orange. It's a bit more structured than the back garden and its hint of formality suits the traditional trim and shutters on the cottage's facade.
There will be ooohs and aaahs over the elaborate and lovely gardens surrounding the big homes on today's tour. But I suspect that many visitors will appreciate Stephanie's gardens for their illustration of what one person can do with a small property.
Rob Howard lives and gardens in Hamilton. He's a garden writer, speaker and garden coach. You can reach him at gardenwriterrob@gmail.com or on Facebook at Rob Howard: Garden Writer.