For a quarter of a century, the Gig Harbor Garden Tour has inspired master gardeners as well as the weekend weed puller with stunning ideas for their own gardens while fostering literacy efforts in the Gig Harbor community. The 2024 event marks the 25-year anniversary of this endeavor.
“We began with this idea to increase literacy, the ability to read and write in English,” says Jan Reeder, the nonprofit organization’s board president. “All of the founders had a passion for gardening, and we thought annually showcasing local gardens would be a good way to raise money for the community.”
And, indeed, this little organization has raised a good deal of money. The annual tour (except for COVID shutdown years) has brought in over a half million dollars and distributed grants to more than 22 schools and area organizations to support struggling readers and to provide books to youth and adults. Some of the organizations include Communities In Schools of Peninsula, Boys and Girls Club, Gig Harbor and Key Peninsula libraries, Harbor History Museum, Pediatrics Northwest, Peninsula Pediatric Therapy and the Rotary of Gig Harbor. Grants have been awarded to at least 10 elementary schools in the Gig Harbor, Key Peninsula and Olalla areas.
“People sometimes ask us if we are a garden club,” Reeder says. “We are not. We do refer people to local garden clubs, such as the Horsehead Bay Garden Club. But our group primarily serves to select interesting gardens that will appeal to a broad range of tastes so that we can make money and give it away to foster literacy.”
Reeder notes that over the years, literacy needs have changed. “We began with the idea of primarily funding adult literacy. Now, we see a need for English language literacy in both children and adults, as well as the need for books, both in the schools and for children who need medical care in the hospital,” she says.
The tour’s “management” consists of a working board whose primary responsibility is fiduciary, and a committee who selects the gardens, organizes the parking, creates the marketing materials and works tremendously hard to get the word out. The weekend tour draws about 1,500 visitors to Gig Harbor, primarily from Jefferson, King, Kitsap, Pierce and Thurston counties.
This year’s six gardens range from one professionally designed and landscaped by Scott Junge of Rosedale Gardens to a garden influenced by the finest English traditions and embellished by the work of local artist Tom Torrens. All the gardeners are passionate about their love of nature, their care and nurturing of their gardens and tranquil places created by their gardens for spring, summer and fall wanderings and conversations.
Bethany and Steve Bennett have a 1.5-acre lot tucked off Crescent Valley Drive. Their garden conforms to the natural contours of the property from which Bethany Bennett has created garden rooms and wandering spaces. A feature of her garden is her work with azaleas and trees.
“I’m from the South and I just love my azaleas,” she says with a waterfall gurgling in the background. This waterfall is no small stream. It flows over a man-made creek bed downhill, providing a musical solace in the warmth of summer days. At the top of the waterfall is a “beach” — a sandy stretch with lawn chaises to enjoy a great book and a glass of lemonade.
Providing a good background to this spot are tremendous evergreens. “The bigger the tree, the better. The first thing I did when we moved in 17 years ago was plant trees,” Bennett says, pointing up the hill to what are now substantial evergreens that circle the property and grace it in privacy.
When asked how she knew what to plant where, Bennett echoes the sentiments of the other gardeners. “I read the labels. I ask questions,” she says. “It’s been a learning process.”
Two of this year’s gardens are right in the middle of downtown Gig Harbor. Laura and Chris McMonnies’ warm home and garden is on Shyleen Street while Lee and Del Diede’s are in a new, architecturally stunning home and landscape on North Harborview Drive.
Laura McMonnies has been working on her garden for 4 years. Each year, the garden evolves. When the couple moved in, they completely remodeled both the home and garden, which included 32 trucks of dirt to create the terraces of the current garden.
Like the Bennetts’ garden, water can be heard trickling throughout the garden “rooms.” Previously, the McMonnieses had lived in Texas, where it was hard to have a garden. They wanted to make their garden cohesive and a place of discovery and enjoyment.
When asked how to describe her garden, McMonnies says, “I like a cottage garden — a little this, a little that — and I really wanted my garden to have a Northwest feel. I just love learning about plants and design.”
This garden has lots of terraces with interesting perennials, hydrangeas, lavender, Japanese maples and staircases made of poured concrete taking visitors from one room to the other. The garden fosters an environment for butterflies and bees and has places for conversational areas, veggie gardens and quiet exploring.
When Del and Lee Diede designed their home, they began with two knowns: Their son, Brent Diede, would design it, and they would begin with the garden before the house even was framed.
Perched high above North Harborview Drive, the terrain of the vacant lot was a challenge. They brought in 800 tons of rock for the walls and as the foundation was being poured, began the contours of the garden. They had worked with Scott Junge of Rosedale Gardens at their former home and knew he had an aesthetic they could embrace. Mostly, they wanted a low-maintenance garden that would also have formal spaces and places to encourage outdoor entertaining, as well as be colorful and park-like.
“We really wanted to take in the view of the harbor as well as the garden,” Lee Diede explains.
The garden is a painter’s palette, with areas of vibrant pink shrub roses serving as ground cover, manicured boxwood carving out formal entries, and purple and blue perennials and yellow stock annuals embracing garden sculpture. While the couple didn’t want any leaves to rake, there are lovely red maples throughout the garden, giving the property color during the different seasons.
Designing a house and garden simultaneously is a challenge. Del Diede says that a person should “think about the garden before the structure.”
“Preplan the garden as a preliminary step,” Diede advises. “If people don’t think this way, it can really limit what you can design.”
Not everyone has the luxury to build a home and garden from scratch, and many homeowners move into properties with mature plantings, especially trees. Patti Rodgers and Louise Earle with son Chris Laurion have taken the natural, forested backdrop of their gardens and used them as an underpainting for their garden design.
Rodgers moved into her home in 2014 after living in Montana and Florida for several years. “I love living here,” she says. “Pretty much anything will grow.”
Her garden is primarily a shade one, with later-blooming shade plants such as hostas. She has created grass pathways, as well as a grass meadow for strolling and play. Rodgers’ selection of perennials is profuse. She notes that she really doesn’t have any more room to add new plants.
Unlike many gardeners, Rodgers did not start out with a plan. “I like taking an eclectic approach to my garden. It is carefree that way, and thus I can just enjoy the flowering plants among my large shady trees,” she explains.
Visitors to her garden will find interesting little touches of whimsey among the flower beds — a yellow birdhouse tucked in with ferns and hostas, a heron that seems to step upon blooming yellow day lilies. And beds of black-eyed Susans and Shasta daisies give off bright spectacles of color in all that greenery.
Earle and Laurion took a careful approach to designing their garden, planning where they would place structures and plants while using natural elements as framework.
“I simply love the way the forest frames our garden,” says Earle, who relocated to Gig Harbor from Southern California. “Our back garden was pretty much brambles when we moved in nine years ago. The first thing we did was to prune and remove the brambles, then put in a stone retaining wall.”
The retaining wall, graced with hostas and grasses, gives a framework to a stunning rock waterfall, creating a 60-foot fall and constantly circulating “river.” Their patio, with outside areas for cooking and eating, is perfect for viewing the waterfall and is enhanced by black and green bamboo, which lights up in the evening.
Beyond the patio and waterfall is a winding path that leads to a nice children’s play area, perfect for imaginative games and storytelling.
Aside from the natural setting, plenty of Japanese maples and hydrangeas, both in the front and the back, frame the house.
Many Gig Harbor residents have moved into neighborhoods with restrictive regulations known as covenants, conditions and restrictions. This is the case with Valerie Hudson’s home, a stunning example of how a bit of planning, design and effort can turn a newer property into a showcase. Hudson and landscape designer Sally Cross collaborated to create a garden design prior to breaking ground, so that the homeowner’s association could assess how it would contribute to the neighborhood. The result is a unique asset to a newer, otherwise homogenous neighborhood.
The front of the house is framed by ornamental grasses, hanging begonias, lavenders and hydrangeas that can take sun. Golden hops mask otherwise ordinary downspouts.
Visitors enter the back garden through an exquisite rose gate designed and fabricated by Gig Harbor artists Tom and James Torrens. Once inside, they’re greeted by a variety of charming pathways, echoing English country gardens filled with annuals, perennials, fragrant climbing roses and hydrangeas (supported by trellises, again made by the Torrens team), clematis, fruit trees, magnolias, hellebores and dwarf boxwood. Seating areas are tucked in for a tête-à-tête, with a larger patio space for gatherings. A granite water feature off the main patio provides rhythmic calm.
“I’ve lived here five years, and it took nearly three years to see the garden that you see now,” Hudson says. “It really is my special place.”
Helping to commemorate the Gig Harbor Garden Tour’s silver anniversary is the annual selection of artwork. This year, Olalla artist Beth Owen’s painting, “Pretty in Pink,” featuring hanging fuchsias, will be the visual by which the garden tour is recognized. Event tickets include a directional map as well as garden descriptions to help visitors plan their visits to each garden. As in years past, vendors will be present at each garden, offering opportunities to purchase locally propagated plants and unique, handmade, artistic objects.
In reflecting about the Gig Harbor Garden Tour over the years, Reeder says, “It really is a great joy to know how much we have changed people’s lives through the gift of enhancing their literacy and to know that we are a pillar event each summer in our community.”
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