500 Holly Street.

Notice the welcoming stone entrance to the garden at 500 Holly Street.  This is the Ashland Garden Club’s Garden of the Month for July 2023, home to Kathy and Stephen French.  

A massive redesign of the entire yard in 2009 was conducted by Kerry KenCairn of KenCairn Landscape Architecture, with graceful curved stairs featured in both front and back gardens.

The Frenches purchased the property in 2021 from Nina and Paul Winans who had masterminded the earlier redesign.  Kathy French especially appreciates the sequential blooming times for different components of the garden which include iris, rhododendron, tulip, and hydrangea.  And both Frenches enjoy the bounty of the many fruit trees that the Winans had specified in working with KenCairn, only two of which were already on the property and now include two apples, pear, sour cherry, and fig.  

Before the 2009 overhaul, Paul Winans personally dug up many rocks on the steeply sloped lot, which were later incorporated into the retaining walls in back.  Raised beds in the side yard allow for a fine kitchen garden, currently filled with tomato plants and an essential assortment of fresh herbs—including thyme, basil, rosemary, and chives—to season any meal.

Currently, Rudolfo Ramirez and his crew mow the lawns and do the more routine maintenance.  Kathy French averages about an hour a day more closely grooming the garden.  And Stephen French does the occasional big jobs, including pruning the many trees.

With thanks to Marilyn Love for suggesting this garden.

Article by: Ruth Sloan, AGC Garden of the Month Chairperson