This gallery contains 36 photos.
“rambling” around
Gallery
This gallery contains 36 photos.
Category Archives: cool factor
help uncork the cure to cancer by attending the 27th annual wine festival to crush cancer at the dilworthtown inn!
Even grey fall skies couldn’t keep people away October, 2017!!
You know summer is reaching her end when you get the notification that it’s time to buy your tickets for the Dilworthtown Wine Festival!! We love this fall event. It’s fun, it’s outside, it’s just a fabulous day.
On Sunday, October 14, 2018 more than 1,500 oenophiles will help uncork the cure to cancer as they celebrate the 27th Annual Wine Festival at the fabulous Dilworthtown Inn.
As Chester County’s favorite wine event, the festival features more than 100 wines, craft beers, sumptuous fare prepared by Dilworthtown Inn chefs and local food trucks, a silent auction, shopping opportunities in the Gallery of Artisan Vendors, live music, a Performance Car Show, and much more. Proceeds from the wine festival benefit patients of The Abramson Cancer Center at Chester County Hospital and Neighborhood Health.
For friends and family members battling cancer, the cancer specialties at Chester County Hospital bring the world-class care of the Abramson Cancer Center close to home. As part of Penn Medicine, it offers the latest treatment protocols and cutting-edge technology.
The outstanding medical staff, clinical team, nurse navigators and hospital volunteers are known for providing the highest level of care and attention to the needs of our patients. And, the hospital works to give every patient every edge in their battle with cancer, including assistance for patients who are uninsured and under-insured. Outside of the hospital, patients continue to have access to the highest level of care through the services of Neighborhood Health (home health, hospice, private duty, and Senior HealthLink services).
The Wine Festival is organized by the Brandywine and Greystone Women’s Auxiliaries to the hospital. To attend, volunteer, sponsor or donate, visit www.2crushcancer.com or call 610.431.5054.
As a 7 year breast cancer survivor as of June 1st, I attend this event because I know what good Chester County Hospital and Penn Medicine do. I would not be alive if it wasn’t for Penn Medicine. So I make it a point to attend this event and support it, for that very reason. Hokey as it may sound, it is the truth.
I have friends who work so hard on this event from the volunteers to the wine brokers. It is an absolutely glorious way to spend an afternoon, so I hope you will consider buying tickets and attending.
VISIT EVENTBRITE TO EASILY PURCHASE TICKETS TODAY!
Event Details:
When: Sunday, October 14, 2018 – 12 noon to 4 pm (rain or shine)
Where: Dilworthtown Inn, 1390 Old Wilmingtown Pike, West Chester, PA 19382
Questions: Contact Kate Pergolini at 610.431.5054 or Kate.Pergolini@uphs.upenn.edu
General Admission Tickets: $45 until October 6, 2018/ $50 starting October 7, 2018
Enjoy the Grand Tasting of more than 100 wines & Craft Beer, Performance Car Show, Live Entertainment, Silent Auction and Shopping Gallery. Food is available for purchase from local food trucks.
VIP Tickets: $110 until October 6, 2018/$115 starting October 7, 2018
Your VIP Ticket includes all of the above, plus it is also your pass to the VIP tent, where you can enjoy reserved seating, fruit and cheese, special wines, gourmet food and more.
Designated Driver Packages: $225
We want you to enjoy the day responsibly. The designated driver package includes 5 General Admission Tickets and One Free Designated Driver Ticket. The Designated Driver Ticket allows you to enjoy the Performance Car Show, Shopping Gallery, Live Entertainment, Silent Auction and also includes lunch and a non-alcoholic beverage.
going goshen
I went to the Goshen Country Fair for the first time ever earlier this evening.
So much fun! I had never been and always wanted to go.
A friend of mine is part of the donut team at the fair and texted us this afternoon and said we had to go.https://extension.psu.edu
I am so glad we did. The fair is pure summer old-fashioned fun! They even had a pie eating contest for kids!
Smaller than the Kimberton Fair, I enjoyed it so much. They had livestock, rides, games, a wonderful chicken dinner, bingo, and of course the once a year treats, warm homemade donuts! And Penn State Extension was there too!
One of the extra fun things for me was the opportunity for the behind the scenes tour of the donut making! I put it on Facebook live on the blog’s Facebook page too!
I also checked out some of foods people entered for judging. Pickled things, honey, jams, and more.
In this crazy world we live in, the simplicity of this terrific fundraiser for Goshen Fire Company was a delight.
As per their history, the Goshen Fire Company was started in 1950 in a small garage in the “Milltown” section of East Goshen with one fire truck and has grown to what it is today, two stations housing 15 pieces of fire apparatus including 3 engines, 2 ladders, 1 rescue, 4 EMS units, 1 traffic unit, 1 brush truck, 1 support unit and 2 chief response vehicles.
Station 54 is located at 1320 Park Ave West Chester PA 19380. Station 56 is located at 1299 Boot Road, West Chester PA 19380.
This was I believe the 69th edition of the fair. Tonight it wraps up the fair for this year.
bad gardener?
David Austin English Rose in the rain today
Recently Fine Gardening has featured my Chester County garden in their online Garden of the Day section. That has been such a thrill and honor for me because…well…I have been sending them garden photos for years. They have been a gardening resource forever, and I subscribe to their print magazine.
Fine Gardening is a go to resource for information, new cultivar suggestions, and all around inspiration.
I can tell you I purchased this from Applied Climatology at The West Chester Growers Market a couple of years ago. The tag has long since disappeared.
Well Fine Gardening most recently featured some of my daylilies and hydrangeas together. Naturally it provoked a conversation with the editor I was working with over cultivars. I can tell people the names of a few of them like Cherokee Star because I planted some particularly well loved cultivars in clumps of several plants. (Well exception to the clump rule were the $5 pots of mystery daylilies from Home Depot end of summer sale a few years ago! I still don’t know who they are!)
When asked about my daylily cultivars, this is what I told them:
OK, you know where I am a really bad gardener? I see things and I think to myself, “They are perfect,” and then I forget what the cultivars are. I can tell you who I purchased all the daylilies from plant by plant, but as far as cultivars, I am so bad. I am going to have to start writing things down.
I try to plant everything with the tags, but as time progresses and I add more shredded leaves or wood chips for mulch, they disappear.
The thing about daylilies is that I buy them for the color. They don’t get purchased because they are rare or anything like that per se; it’s based on the color. I love white daylilies, but my obsession the past few years has been the reds. I also like the pink and the ruffly daylilies depending on the color because they look so ladylike. I don’t know how else to describe it.
Every once in a while I will pick up daylilies on clearance from a big box store to plug a hole, but for the most part I spend the money to shop from nurseries I know because then I’ll avoid things like daylily rust.
Confession time: I do this with well….the majority of plants. I buy plants for how they hit me when I see them. And that is in person or in a magazine or in a plant grower’s inventory photos.
To me, right or wrong it’s the visual. Color. Texture. Shape. Size. How does the plant strike me? My poor hostas are also victims of garden anonymity. They live happily in plant witness protection services with many of my other shrubs and perennials.
I always have good intentions. I plant new thing with their tags. But then I either get tired of a forest of plastic tags, or I decide I will always remember their cultivar and yank them out, or they get buried by seasonal layers of mulch and applications of fallen leaves. And then there are the plastic tags that chipmunks and squirrels dig up and relocate (oh yes they DO do that!)
Hydrangea “Little Lime”
This is where I am a bad gardener to some. But you know what? I have been through plenty of gardens, including European ones and I see tags for rare specimen trees and some shrubs, but not tags for much of anything else. And for the most part, I do not like looking at plastic nursery tags and I do not have the time or inclination for pretty write on copper ones.
It is what it is. I created my garden because it brings me joy.
I look at what I plant much in the way an artist looks at something for subject matter. It is also very visceral. I look at something and can visualize it in a spot in the garden and then I plant it. Truthfully it is almost a kissing cousin of the techniques people who are practitioners of Shamanic Gardening. And I didn’t intend it to be. It’s just what happened.
Shamanic Gardening? What’s that you ask?
Shamanic Gardening integrates sustainable ancient and traditional gardening methods with shamanic principles and modern permaculture. The practices, history, myths, recipes, and philosophies inside this book will enhance your relationship with nature, sustain the earth, delight your senses, and nourish your soul.
Shamanic Gardening [book] includes a cultural history of sustainable gardening, including gardening techniques used by Cleopatra, the Japanese, the Pueblo Indians, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, and many others.
I learned about the theories of Shamanic Gardening from Melinda Joy Miller’s book Shamanic Gardening. You can find the book on Amazon and other places.
As a theory, it sounds new-agey. To an extent it is. It also fits in with the principles of Feng Shui. (See Shambhalla Institute and NO I am not one of their clients or practitioners. I just went ‘web wandering as I was reading the book out of curiosity. But heck even the esteemed British Royal Horticultural Society has been interested in this or they would not have sold the book.)
The reason I delved into the book were funny little things like they say to essentially ask the plant where it want so go. Any rabid gardener will tell you we all talk to our plants…and weeds. It’s just a thing. But because it also reminds me of using the principles of feng shui in gardens. Yes really. (Read more here.)
Echinacea “White Double Delight”
Anyway back to bad gardener of it all. Since my garden has been in Fine Gardening there has been interest in my garden for local tours. That never happened before. My garden is a layered garden with four season interest and of my own design, not formal with fussy parterres and fountains.
Today some really nice ladies toured my garden. For consideration in a 2019 event. But when they asked me if I knew all of the names of a few of my hostas I answered truthfully that no I did not. I explained to them how I chose my plants for color, shape, texture, etc and how I thought they would fit. I also said some were gifted out of other gardens where they had lived for many years without anyone remembering their names. Right or wrong, I felt in the moment like a very bad gardener who had flunked a horticulture class.
Really, I am sorry for my plant amnesia. I should write down cultivars more diligently. I just don’t. I see, I feel, I plant, I enjoy.
My garden is something I enjoy very much. It’s not a formal arboretum — its a four sided, rambling, four seasons kind of a country garden. To my English and Irish friends it is I am told very similar to their native cottage gardens. But to old school garden club folks, that is not necessarily acceptable here in the U.S.
Cottage gardens and layered gardens are actually a lot more work than a lot of other gardens. It’s a sensory thing with jumbles of flowers and plants and paths and nooks and seating areas. And other elements to add whimsy. But you have to keep everything trimmed properly or all of a sudden it is just too much garden.
But a cottage garden is the perfect rule breakers garden. Plant what you love. Appeal to your own taste and style. Make it romantic. And lush.
A true cottage garden says come in and wander and stay a while. So if people think that about my garden, that is the nicest thing for me. After all, gardens should be shared…just forgive the garden amnesia. I can tell you who I bought each plant from, just not it’s particular cultivar name necessarily. And I never took Latin, so what you get in Latin from me is a gift, usually mispronounced.
I must also note that just because someone’s garden is welcoming, it doesn’t mean you should just come wander. Ask the gardener first. Otherwise, it’s sadly trespassing and at a minimum a little disconcerting to the homeowner who wasn’t expecting guests.
Thanks for stopping by.
Here are the Fine Gardening posts:
- A Labor of Love
One gardener’s creation
By Fine Gardening editors - Welcome Back
Another look at a wonderful garden
By Fine Gardening editors - A Perfect Combination: Daylilies and Hydrangeas
Blending two reliable plants to great effect
By Fine Gardening editors
bermuda botanical gardens
Beauty awaits all who enter the Bermuda Botanical Gardens
Buckle up readers, I went “rambling” off shore recently. Bermuda to be precise. What a beautiful place!
Needless to say I have a lot of photos still to go through, but I wanted to share with you my photos of the Bermuda Botanical Gardens.
Before we left I researched some things I wanted to tour specifically. As I am a rabid gardener, I have heard for a long time how spectacular the Bermuda Botanical Gardens were. And rather historic as far as botanical gardens go.
We took a bus from where the ferry docked in Hamilton to the botanical gardens in Paget Parish. The bus we rode is the number 7 and is considered the most scenic bus route, incidentally.
Where we got off was a bus stop sort of in between the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital and the botanical gardens.
When I had researched the gardens they looked different from what I found. There was also supposed to be a visitors center where you could buy bottled water and gifts.
HAMILTON & CENTRAL BERMUDA
Bermuda Botanical Gardens
Indulge your senses with a trip to the Bermuda Botanical Gardens, and experience the sweet smells and vibrant colours of roses, frangipani and flowering hibiscus. Established in 1898, these 36 acres have been a popular spot to walk and relax among the lush foliage for more than a century. Along with flowers, you’ll find a palm garden with native palmetto trees, a subtropical fruit garden and a sensory garden for the blind, with Braille signs fronting fragrant blooms and herbs. Greenhouses hold collections of orchids and succulents, and the grounds are also home to Camden House, the official residence of Bermuda’s Premier, and the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art.
Special Features: Good for Groups, Kid-Friendly, Wedding/Event Venue on Site
Bermuda Attractions: Bermuda Botanical Gardens
The Bermuda Botanical Garden was inaugurated in 1898. The 35-acre landscaped park located in Paget parish, numerous flowers, shrubs, trees & plantations including a vast collection of subtropical fruit trees, hibiscus, an aviary and Banyan trees. The Garden has large glass houses with cacti and orchids along with formal gardens and lawns. There is also an aromatic garden designed for blind visitors.
There is a Visitor Center in the garden area which is open from 9:30am to 3:30pm (Monday to Friday)….The Camden House is located at the Bermuda Botanical Gardens. It is designated as the official residence of Bermuda’s Premiere and is an impressive colonial building with painted shutters and fretwork. Built in the early 1700s, Camden House is a great example of typical Bermudian architecture. It has a fine collection of art and antiques.
You can combine a visit to the Botanical Gardens with a free tour inside the Camden House. If you are carrying your lunch basket, there are picnic tables around this area for you to relax in the shades and enjoy your lunch. Alternatively for breakfast or lunch visit Homer’s Cafe. It’s located inside the Masterworks Art Museum within the garden area. There is also a cafe at the Visitors Center of the garden serving fresh fruits, salads, sandwiches, wraps, beverages etc.
Behind Camden House, there is a beautiful rose garden, and a kitchen garden showcasing many types of herbs and cut flowers. There is also an aviary here with peacocks, ducks and many other birds. Lawns stretch from here all the way towards South Road having many matured trees like cedars and acacias. Some of the lawns are bordered with beds of seasonal flowers like lilies, freesias and dahlias.
Botanic Gardens Conservation International
About the The Bermuda Botanical Gardens
169 South Road in Paget Parish DV 04. Or P. O. Box HM 834, Paget HM CX. Phone (441) 236-4201. Fax (441) 236- 7582. Since April 2002 part of the Department of Conservation Services of the Bermuda Government’s Ministry of the Environment. On Main Island. The largest local public garden by far. One mile from the City of Hamilton, they are open daily from sunrise to sunset, via Berry Hill Road, Point Finger Road and South Road. Bus routes 1, 2 and 7 go to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital nearby. Open 365 days a year. Free for 362 days (except during the Agricultural Exhibition every April). A mix of park, woodland, greenhouses, agricultural buildings and horticultural collections. A Bermuda National Park under the Bermuda National Parks Act 1986. Chiefly of interest for its trees, orchard, collection of orchids and Camden. Visitors should expect a fair amount of walking. The Bermuda Botanical Society – a Bermuda Registered Charity # 249 – provides them from its Visitor Centre (9:30 am to 3:30 pm) in the Gardens, on Tuesdays, Wednesdays & Fridays 10:30 am year-round, weather permitting.
Main Address: The Bermuda Botanical Gardens
P.O. Box HM 20
HAMILTON
HM AX Bermuda
Telephone: 1441 236 4201
Fax: 1441 236 7582
URL: http://www.bermuda4u.com/Attractions/bermuda_attractions_bermuda_botanical_gardens.htmlStaff Details
Director’s Name: P.J.Truran
Curator’s Name: Lisa Outerbridge
I loved the gardens. They are spectacular even in the sad state of disrepair they are in.
Locals I asked on Bermuda tell me government budget cuts are to blame. However, as in all things political, Camden House (think Bermuda’s White House) home of Bermuda’s Premier located at one end of the botanical garden grounds apparently has no expense spared on it. Ahh government, right?
But meanwhile there is NO Visitors Center, the is NO aviary (no clue where all the birds went – there were Macaws, Peacocks, Parrots, Chickens and who knows how many other birds.) And the rose garden? Didn’t see it. I know it’s there, but I did not see it which was a bummer.
Needless to say, contrary to what was advertised on one tourist website, there were no happy volunteers to show you around. We wandered around ourselves.
It was brutally humid and threatening thunder storms the day we toured and the gardens were eerily empty for summer. I do not pretend to understand the government of this island paradise but those gardens were established in 1898 and is home to many amazing plant specimens.
As FODOR’S says in a 2009 travel guide:
Established in 1898, the Botanical Gardens are filled with exotic subtropical plants, flowers, and trees. The 36-acre property features a miniature forest, an aviary, a hibiscus garden with more than 150 species, and collections of orchids, cacti, fruits, and ferns. In addition to these must-see sights is an intriguing must-smell one: the Garden for the Sightless. Designed primarily for the blind, it has fragrant plants (like geranium, lemon, lavender, and spices), plus Braille signage. Weather permitting, free 60- to 90-minute guided tours of the Botanical Gardens begin from the Visitor’s Information Centre at 10:30 Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.
The sensory garden still exists, but needs love. The same with every garden space within the 36 amazing acres.
Frommers had this to say to potential travelers:
This 14-hectare (35-acre) landscaped park, maintained by the Department of Natural Resources, is one of Bermuda’s major attractions. Hundreds of clearly identified flowers, shrubs, and trees line the pathways. Attractions include collections of hibiscus and subtropical fruit, an aviary, banyan trees, and even a garden for the blind. A 90-minute tour leaves at 10:30am on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, taking you through lushly planted acres. Guests meet at the Berry Hills entrance near the Botanical Gardens Visitor’s Center. On the Tuesday and Friday tour, participants stop in at Camden, the official residence of Bermuda’s premier, for a look around. The cafe sells sandwiches and salads (soup and chili in winter). Early in 2008, the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art opened within a much-restored, much rebuilt building in these gardens. And in the spring of 2008, the Botanical Gardens launched an ambitious 5-year plan to introduce four separate gardens of themed plants, including a Japanese Zen Garden, a 17th-century-style English Parterre Garden, a 12th-century-style Persian Garden, and a Tudor-style Children’s Maze Garden.
The Japanese Zen Garden while lovely is struggling. The Parterre Garden, Persian Garden, and Children’s Maze Garden sit empty. And throughout the gardens not one fountain is running. Except in fairness, it is summer on an island so they also have to conserve water.
And yet, even as a victim of Bermudian government budget cuts so obvious it makes you wince if you are a garden lover, these gardens still shine and should be gone through. For me to see things like Bird of Paradise flowers just growing naturally, or amaryllis, and many other things including spice trees and big bushes of rosemary and lavender it was heavenly.
The problem I think with these gardens is the Bermuda Botanical Gardens fall under the purview of Bermuda Government Park System. We all know in the US that lovely phrase we’re from the government and we’re here to help….and the reality.
I have been searching and searching for a more comprehensive history of these gardens because they so captured my attention. Haven’t found much, but I did find an ancient New York Times article:
New York Times: Along a Nature and Garden Trail
By PAULA DEITZMARCH 18, 2001
IN 1609, when Sir George Somers and his crew sailed from England to the Virginia Colony on the Sea Venture, they were shipwrecked between two reefs just off the coast of Bermuda, and thus were among the first to lay eyes on the lush primeval forest of cedar and palmetto that covered the subtropical archipelago. As Bermuda was one of the few island clusters in the world without a native population, early botanic observers had the opportunity to record flora untouched by human habitation before the 17th century — with the exception of the occasional shipwrecked crew that either perished or stayed on shore long enough to build a ship out of cedar and sail on.
In time, it was discovered that there are 17 endemic plants on the island (those that grow naturally nowhere else in the world), including the Bermuda cedar (Juniperus bermudiana), the Bermuda palmetto (Sabal bermudana) and the olivewood (Cassine laneana). Landowners’ wealth was judged by the number of cedars on their estates…
Mind you my research while it doesn’t find much on the history and early horticulturalists of the Bermuda Botanical Gardens has turned up that the Department of Environment and Natural Resources is also based in/around these gardens.
So how is it they do not seem to want the gardens to shine? How can the Premier of Bermuda ignore what is literally outside his front door?
I noticed there is a citizens group on Facebook called Take Back Our Park They organized because of a threat of development of a maintenance yard there. So yes, imagine a public works department complete with all that a public works facility entails in the middle of your favorite park. (Read this letter in a local Bermuda paper about it.)
Thankfully, on June 28, 2018 the Bermuda residents prevailed and the Botanical Gardens were saved from that plan. (Read this article in the Royal Gazette.)
I hope these people persist and get some attention and funding directed towards these gardens. I am happy to be able to share my photos with all of you. It really is a special place.
At one end of the grounds close to where the aviary I think was is a museum and a cafe. The museum is the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art.
Homer’s Cafe inside the museum is run by a local catering company called The Salty Lime.
The cafe is lovely and the people warm and welcoming. The museum is quite interesting but the staff at the front desk of the museum aren’t particularly welcoming, or at least the woman I encountered wasn’t.
The permanent collection of the museum includes works by Winslow Homer, Georgia O’Keeffe, Marsden Hartley, Charles Demuth and Henry Moore. The museum is dedicated to Bermuda. Everything in it depicts things inspired by Bermuda. Paintings, sculpture, photography and more. It covers the range of time from 1700 until today. I believe the museum was founded in 1987. It is quite unusual and as a tourist I would not have known it was something to see except for the fact I stumbled upon it.
In the courtyard of the museum and cafe is this sculpture dedicated to former Beatle, John Lennon. As I discovered in an old AdWeek article:
The British musician and artist spent several months in Bermuda during his last trip abroad, and the island served as his muse. Bermuda pays special tribute with “Double Fantasy,” a sculpture dedicated last year in Lennon’s honor.
Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art commissioned local sculptor Graham Foster to create the six-foot Cor-Ten steel structure. The work shows a stylized double-sided profile of Lennon and his “granny” glasses with his Rickenbacker guitar, doves of peace, and the double fantasy freesia flower. At approximately 4,000 pounds, it’s a weighty piece, and sits on a raised flowerbed in a courtyard near the museum’s entrance. The sculpture is located in Bermuda’s Botanical Gardens, on the island’s south shore in Paget parish.
Read more about the Double Fantasy sculpture on THIS WEBSITE.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the photos and if traveling to Bermuda, try to visit the Bermuda Botanical Gardens. Especially because I feel they may be at risk. As I continue to go through my photos I will add other posts about Bermuda.
Thanks for rambling along to Bermuda this evening.
step back in time this fall for chester county day 2018
Photo Credit East Whiteland Township from their website. From US Library of Congress: Michael Gunkle Spring Mill, Moore Road (East Whiteland Township), Bacton, Chester County, PA
Now I make no secret of the fall house tour events I hold dear in Chester County which are the Tredyffrin Historic Preservation Trust House Tour (I am a sponsor and this year it’s Saturday September 29th) and the tour that started it all for me many moons ago (used to go with my parents long before calling Chester County home) — Chester County Day!
My books 🙂
Today I am writing about Chester County Day which began in 1936. I love this event so much, I even have the following books: Forty Years of Days, Chester County & Its Day, and Barns of Chester County Pennsylvania which were all written by a Chester County treasure named Berenice M. Ball.
The Women’s Auxiliary to Chester County Hospital has been supporting the hospital for 125 years through numerous fundraising activities and events. One of the beloved fundraisers that has stood the test of time is Chester County Day, the longest running house tour in the United States. This year’s tour will be held Saturday, October 6, 2018 from 10 am to 5 pm. Since its founding in 1936, “The Day,” as it is affectionately called, has raised more than $5 million for the hospital, earning $132,000 last year alone.
This year The Day includes tours of 16 homes and six public structures/historic sites in the northeast quadrant, including Exton, Frazer, Chester Springs, Kimberton, and Phoenixville.
The Day will kick off with the pageantry and excitement of a traditional fox hunt. The hunt will set off promptly at 9 am from Birchrunville. At 10 am guests can begin their tour of this year’s selected properties.
The 2018 tour celebrates the traditional, distinctive architecture of Chester County with some twists. There is a beautifully restored home in West Vincent Township which is believed to have been deeded to a Revolutionary War soldier in payment for his service. Also on the tour is a meticulously kept stone home with great antiques, rugs and a lovingly-cared for garden.
A spectacularly restored Queen Ann-style home is one of the stops in West Whiteland Township. The home was designed and built in 1851 by Andrew Jackson Downing, a prominent advocate of the Gothic Revival in the United States. The fountains, gardens, mahogany-lined rooms and diamond lead-paned windows of this house are remarkable. When the owner first purchased this property, oil had seeped into the basement and water leaked from the attic down to the first floor. The renovation of the home has returned it to its original, unforgettable state. Around the corner is a pristine stone R. Brognard Okie house set on a hill with a beautiful stone-banked garage.
Loch Aerie pre-renovation. My photo.
Loch Aerie Mansion in Frazer will also open its newly revamped doors to the tour this year. Also featured in East Whiteland? Gunkle Spring Mill! Gunkle Mill is a nationally registered historical resource. Michael Gunkle built this his first mill, in 1793. The structure represents post-Revolutionary development in the Great Valley. By 1872 the mill processed 1,800 tons of flour, feed, corn and oats yearly. At the peak of its productivity, the mill ran 18 hours a day. Gunkle Mill is now owned and cared for by East Whiteland Township. The Mill was placed on the Historic Register in 1978. (Check it out on Library of Congress website HERE.)
Attendees will also have the opportunity to tour a nearly 200-year-old farmhouse/manor house in Chester Springs that has been lovingly repurposed as a business office. The structure has retained much of its original woodwork, pocket doors, cabinetry, stair railings, fireplaces and a beautiful English knot garden. Tour-goers can also explore the largest three-story bank barn in the county located in Charlestown Township. The home boasts hand-hewn, scored beams.
Phoenixville is represented by a restored farmhouse with a pool house that was once the residence of farmhands. Eighteenth and 20th century homes on the grounds of the former Pickering Hunt are optional next stops for attendees. Two houses will be open in Rapps Corner, with the convenience of parking at one home to tour both. Each of the stone houses has been maintained and updated in very individual styles, while respecting the historic bones of each building.
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Chester Springs will serve as a lunch stop, where pre-ordered boxed lunches by Arianna’s Gourmet Café will be available.
The Day offers two ticket options, a regular priced $50 ticket or a $100 VIP ticket. The VIP package includes an invitation to the preview party in September, as well as a gourmet boxed lunch provided by Montesano Bros Italian Market & Catering at an exclusive house tour open only to VIP ticket holders.
With a GPS and a Chester County Day map (that you will receive when you purchase your ticket) the beautiful architecture and bucolic roads of the county are yours to explore!
Event Details:
When: Saturday, October 6, 2018 from 10 am to 5 pm
Where: Northeast Quadrant of Chester County
Tickets: On sale from July 1, 2018 online; September 4th by mail or at the satellite locations listed on their website.
- $50 purchased via web, phone or in person
- $100 VIP tickets, which includes a VIP Reception and Preview Cocktail party at Historic Yellow Springs, Sunday, September 23; Otto’s Mini of Exton, PA will provide a Mini Cooper for qualified guests with purchased VIP tickets, while supplies last and a private tour of a special VIP house with a gourmet boxed lunch served by Montesano Bros Italian Market & Catering. VIP tickets are also available at all satellite locations, as well as via web and phone. (See ChesterCountyDay.com for details.)
Contact: 610-431-5054
More Information: Want to know more about the tour? Attend one of the free public preview lectures throughout the county. For a list of dates and locations, or to download a podcast visit: www.ChesterCountyDay.com
ALSO IMPORTANT TO NOTE: I am writing this post because I want to and because I attend this event. I purchase my own tickets and am a grateful supporter of The Women’s Auxiliary to Chester County Hospital.
as seen at kimberton whole foods malvern
…He had me at “spiritual gangsta” !
Haven’t seen a VW like this in forever.
I hope my blog critics don’t find this to be overly liberal propaganda… it’s just enjoying what you see in the world.
And this guy’s VW made me smile.
more northview gardens photos
Last week I wrote about my visit to Northview Gardens. Here are the rest of the photos. Northview is amazing. I loved it and hope I can return because it is one of those gardens that you will visit and notice something new every time you visit.
moo!!!! “oreo cows”
Oreo cows!! AKA Belted Galloways (Scottish origin). These are the black and whites who live in Willistown. (Or I think it’s Willistown) Some brown and white oreos live out off of 401.
My husband will tell you I have an affinity for farm animals. Not all. But I do love photographing cows, chickens, and goats. And horses, ponies, donkeys. Can’t forget them. (But I digress.)
Anyway….here’s hoping cow photos aren’t too controversial since today someone told me I was posting/writing too much “liberal propaganda”. Sorry not sorry, poor darling, but Ivana’s shoe line isn’t to my liking and she’s shutting down her fashion empire anyway.
Ciao for now LOL
a visit to northview gardens
Today was the summer get together and meeting for the Delaware Valley Hosta Society.
The extra special treat today is we were hosted by Jenny Rose Carey and got to tour her beautiful Northview Gardens.
Ms. Carey is the Senior Director of Meadowbrook Farm , which is now a Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (“PHS”) site, but was once the home of Liddon Pennock.
Jenny Rose Carey is a well known garden lecturer and she practices what she preaches at her own gardens which were amazing.(Click here for more information from an earlier post.)
Northview Gardens is a very cool place with an interesting Philadelphia history. As Jenny says on her website:
Northview’s 4½ acre site was originally part of Wilmer and Anna Atkinson’s 1887 100-acre Victorian Model Farm. Some of the trees planted by Mr. Atkinson (the Founder and Editor of the Farm Journal) remain, including a beautiful 150-year-old Japanese maple. The current property includes the original 1887 farmhouse and carriage house.
The gardens are fun and full of whimsey along with beautiful plantings and plant specimens. Of special note would be the amazing trees including Japnese maples like few have ever seen. Also lots of very cool witch hazels, and a beautiful allée of golden redbuds.
I hope to go back at a future date to explore the gardens further. They are truly unique and inspirational.
Many people were blown away that this lovely 4 1/2 acres just exists quietly where it does in Ambler. To me it is also a wonderful testament to historic preservation and land preservation. We need more Northview Gardens in our lives and fewer Tyvec wrapped plastic mushroom house developments in my humble opinion. 
Northview gardens are beautiful but not fussy. To me they are also a very British garden style, which I love.
The gardens are seperated into what can only be described as different “rooms”, and like a well organized house, each garden room melds and flows into the next.
But again, the gardens are narural and not fussy. They are gardens which beg you to explore down the next path, yet are so comfortable and welcoming. There are lots of seating areas. Lovely vintge and antique garden seating.
And they have fabulous garden building structures like a she shed and a potting shed. 
You can always tell when gardens are created with love, and these gardens are no exception.
Once again, a lovely afternoon with the Delaware Valley Hosta Society. 