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At 45 East Dartmouth Road, Dennis Donahue has created a Zen-like homage to Japanese gardening. This exquisitely maintained garden artfully demonstrates many classic Japanese garden features. Dry rivers of gravel and stone flow around carefully placed (and locally quarried) rocks. A stone lantern nestles low to the ground to light the gravel river. Traditional Japanese "Hide and Reveal" design techniques lure the visitor into and around the garden to explore expertly-pruned conifers, azaleas and grasses.
Bunny Levin's garden at 172 Gramercy Road showcases ebullient mounds of thriving perennials, shrubs and annuals, all neatly retained by walls of dry-laid stone that relate beautifully to the stone Tudor home. This mature mixed border contains a large variety of plants including monarda, phlox, lilies, sedum, astilbe, tall grasses, hosta, coreopsis, and Alchemillla mollis. Winter interest is assured with cherry laurel shrubs.
Ellen Brafman's delightfully lush and lavish garden beds curve gently in and around the lawn space at 181 Summit Lane. Four season interest is masterfully displayed in both sunny and shady cultural conditions. Evergreen selections like blue spruce, yew, and euonymus ground the garden structure while sinuous curves of perennials embrace dual dogwood trees. Notable plants include monarda, asclepias, blood grass, lantana, dahlia, stachys, and hibiscus.
Vandy Solomon, at 435 Levering Mill Road, has created a traditionally designed and planted garden that relates perfectly to the traditional center hall stone colonial it adorns. Peer over the cedar picket fence and you will be delighted to see bees, birds, and even a few bunnies frolicking in and around mounding serpentine beds filled with the plants your grandmother loved. Azalea, magnolia, hydrangea, fothergilla, and buddleia provide serial shrubby and floral interest - while echinacea, daylily, honeysuckle, liatris and monarda show off the pink and yellow color scheme.
7 Derwen Road showcases a skillful arrangement of horticulturally-exciting shade-loving plants that flourish under the high leafy canopy of sycamores. Robert and Sheryl Levy have combined evergreen mahonia, rhododendron, and Ilex crenata 'Sky Pencil' into a model of four-season balanced asymmetry. Underplantings of bergenia, hosta, hardy geranium, hakonechloa, carex, and impatiens provide exquisite foliar contrast and floral interest.
125 Tall Trees Drive presents the extreme garden challenge of a pie shaped slope in full sun bisected by a steeply graded drive. Carole Blum has implemented the perfect solution - a veritable conifer arboretum grows contentedly before her home. Each tree and shrub has been expertly sited and perfectly pruned to maximize design impact and natural form. Chamacyperis, pine, cryptomeria and ilex provide a color continuum from glaucus to golden. Under-plantings of sedum, grasses, echinacea, lavender and sage thrive in the gravelly, dry conditions and provide four seasons of color and texture interest. The graphic pop of tall burgundy cannas flanking the front entrance finishes the show with flair.
Rosa Aukburg has lovingly tended this "woody" nirvana at 433 Levering Mill Road for years, and it shows. Peaceful calm prevails within the leafy borders of this busy corner lot. Thoughtfully-sited borders include a wide diversity of plants that maximize foliar form, textural bark, floral interest, and winter fruits. Stand-out selections include Acer griseum, Kousa dogwood, nandina, mahonia, oakleaf hydrangea, aucuba, and cherry laurel. Shade-loving plants including hosta, pulmonaria, hellebore, and coleus fringe the crisply-bordered beds. Patches of full sun are reserved for lantana, petunia, and zinnia.
If there were seven wonders of Bala Cynwyd, surely the Japanese Garden at The Pagoda Building at 100 Presidential Boulevard would be one of them. This nearly unknown garden masterpiece was initially conceived and created in 1965 by US Naval commander Seltzer Fleck and his wife after an extended tour of duty in Japan. The garden was built to accompany an 'oriental styled' office building they built in Bala Cynwyd and called the Pagoda Building. The original garden included both a cascading stream and a koi pond. Unfortunately, both the building and the garden fell into disrepair until the property was purchased in 1994 by Kennbert Investments. Kennbert hired Jack Miller, an expert in Japanese Garden Design, to renovate and manage the garden. Jack Miller's improvements included draining the koi pond and replacing it with a dry pond and waterfall, adding rock, paths and bridges, and adding plant material. The now-mature garden is an outstanding example of a Japanese garden and may be one of the finest in the Mid-Atlantic region. Tom Coyle is the proud property manager and current gardener. Contact him directly to schedule a tour of the garden and experience firsthand the many beautiful and symbolic Japanese elements on display, including: the Low Entrance Humble Gate, "blood grass" to honor fallen Samurai, a crooked bridge to prevent evil from following, the dry river and waterfall, and stone lanterns to light the way. You will be transfixed and transported, and when you emerge, surprised to find yourself still in Bala Cynwyd.
Herbert Yentis and Company has created a garden at The Colonial Village Shopping Center that promotes a sense of place and visual respite for all the patrons of 138-144 Montgomery Ave. The welcoming and shady stone portico is fronted by a long stretch of four-season color and texture. Shrubs, including the native Ilex glabra as well as mugo pine and chamaecyparis, provide the evergreen winter structure, while miscanthus grass creates movement and texture. Perennial yellow and maroon daylilies and annual pink, blue and white petunias, blue ageratum, yellow marigolds, and pink geraniums provide flashes of summer color.
The sea of asphalt that surrounds the LA Fitness Building in Bala Cynwyd Shopping Center is refreshingly interrupted with shady islands of trees, shrubs, grasses and annuals. Thanks to Federal Realty Investment Trust for assuring that trees like Honey Locust, Ginkgo biloba and Betula nigra are there to provide summer shade and winter bark interest, while masses of knock-out roses, spirea and petunias provide pink puddles of summer color. Evergreen shrubs of Ilex crenata, Ilex glabra and Taxus sp. guarantee winter interest in tough site conditions. Long views of parked cars are masked by tall grasses swaying calmly in the breeze.
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