Most Seattleites are quick to identify a Craftsman home; but what makes a Craftsman garden?
Thanks to the Crafts-mania that gripped America from 1890 through the 1920s, Green Lake’s streets are still graced with scads of distinctive Craftsmans, bungalows, Mission Revival and Tudors riffing off the aesthetic of the Arts and Crafts design movement. If you’re lucky enough to be gardening in one of these, you can make a harmonious pair of your house and garden by consulting the design guidelines of this unique style.
Craftsman house, Wallingford
(If you’re not sure whether your house falls into this category, head to Historic Seattle’s site to find out.)
Gustav Stickley himself, the designer and publicist extraordinaire of the Arts and Crafts movement, details many suggestions on appropriate garden making in his book Craftsman Houses: The 1913 Catalog.
Keep it Casual
Stickley says that informal gardens are
“less expensive, better adapted to small spaces, and more in harmony with our [America’s] somewhat primitive landscape….”
adding,
“…In fact, a formal garden would be quite out of place with such simple, unpretentious houses as those we design. ”
Craftsman design prized architectural detail and a strong linking between house and site, so it makes sense that hard-scaping elements define a Craftsman garden more than its plants. A Craftsman-style wooden arbor or pergola, a distinctively designed slate or brick pathway, or a hand-forged gate will bring the best bang for your budget.
The arbor and the pathway telegraph this new craftsman garden even before any plants have been added.
Natural elements, artisan craftsmanship, and repetition of materials, colors, and motifs all help strengthen the house/garden bond. If your chimney has river rock climbing up from the base, build a fountain spouting from a cairn of similar rocks. If a leaf is carved on your door, repeat it on a bench. Echo a favorite shrub’s color in glazed pots by the door. As you continue these steps, reinforcing the unique features of the site, you will forge an unforgettable sense of place.
Craftsman-style fence in Green Lake softened by bamboo and Japanese maple, which offers a stunning winter presence.
Freestanding trellis highlights corner entrance while ivy runs rampant.
Bonus: many projects can be inexpensively made from leftover rock, slate, or vine clippings.
In suggesting plants, Stickley suggests after looking at the growing conditions, to choose easily grown tough customers like the perennials grown in old-fashioned cottage gardens: Oriental poppies, dianthus, and hollyhocks, for example. Gertrude Jekyll’s masterful pastel-toned perennial borders were the rage during Crafts-mania. Ultimately, your garden will be more “natural” and successful if you choose plants that are happy in Seattle’s environment. While purists might sniff at the inclusion of modern-day hybrids, I think getting the tone right is more important than historical accuracy. If that new lime-green heuchera complements your eggplant front door, I say go for it.
Keep it Loose
“…The freer range one gives to Nature’s own delightful vagaries of planting and growth, and the less one imposes on them man-made boundaries and restrictions the more picturesque and inviting the place will be. ”
A woodland hike on Linden Avenue: plantings mimicking nature fit right in with Arts and Crafts movement ideals
Topiaries need not apply. The occasional squared hedge or boxwood is fine, but overall plants’ natural-born shapes are more in keeping with the style than clipped cones or pompoms. Likewise, curving, winding paths or ponds (especially following site features, like an existing outcrop or tree) are preferred over straight or angled ones. If you have a straight path, you can soften it with plants with an arching habit billowing over the path here and there.
Keep it Quirky
“He [The gardener] will try to take advantage of each irregularity, and work with Nature, coaxing, guiding and bending her to the result desired, rather than trying to force her to fit some rigid, predetermined scheme.”
Don’t fight your wonky site – find ways to feature its unique contours by tracing them with terraces, pathways, water features and flower beds, and mark focal points with architectural plants, garden art or a bench.
Keep it Simple
“In other words, the true Craftsman garden, like the Craftsman home, will be the outcome of working along simple but careful lines.”
Make a clear, unfussy plan starting with the hard-scaping, going on to focal plantings like trees or plants with strong structure for winter interest (such as red-twig dogwood, Phormium, ornamental grasses, or conical conifers), then moving on to flowers and veggies.
Take your time, consult your space, add compost, and enjoy!
Read more about gardening on My Green Lake.
