Sculpture Garden

Inspired by the jungle scenes of French post-impressionist painter Henri Rousseau, this sculptor transformed the garden from an old-fashioned cottage garden to a jungle setting, perfect for his large-scale wooden and ceramic artwork. The plantings are inspired by places he has lived and studied (Hawaii, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea). The tropical influences of plants with huge leaves include Gunnera, giant calla lilies, hairy Bergenia, Chinese mayapple, devil’s club, and ‘Steroidal Giant’ Tetrapanax, the Japanese rice paper plant.

Beneath an immense silver maple, the main garden is accessible via an ADA-compliant ramp.  A series of raised terraces are created from vintage brick, recycled pavement, and quartzite flagstone. Designed for difficult dry shade conditions, unusual plants abound -- species rhododendrons, hardy begonias, rare ferns, Solomon’s seal, edgeworthias, shredded umbrella plants and saxifrages of all kinds. Visitors will marvel at the kraken-like wisteria in the “you can’t espalier that!” section.

The garden has changed from the “I need to have one of everything” collector stage to a purposefully developing stable plant community that offers food and shelter to wildlife as well as aesthetic interest. In Eugene’s words, “Using plants to manipulate space is a challenge because they don’t always cooperate and they’re always changing and doing something unexpected. But that’s what I love most about it – the exhibition is always open and the artwork is never done.”