New Hampshire Home Article: Plots for Collaboration

Photograph by Nancy Belluscio for NH Home

The Boccelli Garden is in the Jan/Feb 2016 issue of New Hampshire Home magazine.

In Gratitude for a Public Parks Champion

Thanksgiving week is an excellent time to take a moment of gratitude for those who have made a difference in our lives and in this case, our community here in Peterborough, New Hampshire. Last month, our Town Administrator, Pam Brenner, retired. Pam has been instrumental in the Public/Private Partnership that have made the gardens in the public parks in Peterborough a success. As a member of the Peterborough Parks Committee, I have been collaborating with Pam for 17 years of her two-decade-long tenure. Pam understood the importance and usefulness of beautiful public spaces in the economic vitality and quality of life of our town and she has been supportive of each and every project in the parks. Pam has been instrumental in securing grants, public funding and collaborating with private philanthropists and gardening volunteers to create parks of the highest quality in both horticulture and design. Thank you, Pam, for all that you have done to make our town a better place. You will be greatly missed! Enjoy your well-deserved retirement.

Putnam Park Path Project IV

The new pathway project at Putnam Park has been nearly completed. The lawns have been hydroseeded and the gardens have been planted.

The Desire Path through the Entrance Garden has already been used and has accomplished its goal of keeping the garden from being trampled by visitors trying to take a short cut. This garden was designed and planted by volunteers. The plant list included salvias, asters, ornamental grasses, hellebores and many other plants. Hopefully it will have a long season of interest. In the next two weeks, bulbs will be planted.

 The new woodland garden was planted with a wide variety of plants chosen for a long season of interest and textural qualities.

 This is the woodland garden from the opposite end of the park. The foliage of Hydrangea quercifolia can be seen to the far right.

The triangular bed containing a large oak tree at the convergence of two paths was planted with Epimedium pinnatum ssp. colchicum from divisions from my garden. This vigorous groundcover has  glossy dark green foliage throughout the season and is extremely drought tolerant. It has bright yellow flowers in April just as the new foliage emerges. The circular bed was planted with Deschampsia cespitosa ‘Goldgehänge’, Persicaria amplexicaulis ‘Fat Domino’ and Cirsium rivulare ‘Atropurpureum’.

The existing mixed border along the path looks full and lush this time of year. I am looking forward to the day when the new gardens have filled in and matured.

Peterborough Parks: A Public/Private Partnership Talk

Tuesday I will be giving talk to to the Littleton, MA Garden Club on how the Peterborough Parks Committee creates and maintains the public gardens in Peterborough. I am excited to share my recipe for success, much of which I learned from Lynden B. Miller, who designs public gardens in New York City.

Here is part of the handout I will be giving the participants:

1) Design only what you can maintain at the highest level. Visit the best possible public and private gardens you can for inspiration. Make it gorgeous and keep it that way. Long-term maintenance is the key. Prepare soil properly from the onset.

2) Funding: start slow and show what you’ve done and grow. Keep trying to get grants even if you fail. Leverage success using volunteers to get public funding, public support and grants. Work toward a long-term endowment.

3) Mixed border works well for four-season beauty. Start with what it looks like in winter using hardscape and plants with winter interest (bark, berry, structure). Foliage is more important than flowers. Use the best and biggest plants you can get. Each park has its own mission statement or intention.

4) Set time and days so volunteers can incorporate time into their schedule. Have a specific plan for what needs to be accomplished each week.

5) Vandalism: Repair damage as soon as you see it!

“Make it gorgeous and they will come. Keep it that way and they will help.”

Lynden B. Miller

Boccelli Garden: the End of the First Season of a Public/Private Partnership Project V

This weekend is 'Peek into Peterborough'. Busloads of tourists come to New England and Peterborough to see the fall foliage. I was hoping things would still be looking vibrant at this point in the season. Now that the grass has grown in, the new project at the Boccelli Garden is looking well-established.

The fall foliage of clethra (yellow) and enkianthus (red) in the far left of the new gardens can be seen from across the Nubanusit River.

We got several new Adirondack chairs for the downtown parks this year.

 About a month ago, we enlarged the new bed below the retaining wall. The original idea was to leave grass below the last 5-6 feet of the retaining wall to create a bench, but I think the enlarged bed envelops the new terrace and existing Boccelli Garden and is an improvemnet even if the "bench" has been lost.

The Boccelli Garden as it has always looked in October.

Boccelli Garden: the Completion of a Public/Private Partnership Project IV

The grass has grown in quickly at the Boccelli Garden Project which has been recently completed. This public/private partnership project was a great success. It involved a private donation for the retaining wall, terrace, shrubs, and grading of the site. The town of Peterborough paid for the new fence along the Nubanusit River, the herbaceous plants and a pair of new Peterbrough Adirondack Chairs, (designed specially for the parks by the Parks Committee) which are under construction. The Public Works Department did much of the heavy labor of the planting and has kept the site watered. And finally, volunteer gardeners have designed the gardens, planted the herbaceous layer and will maintain the gardens in the future. Probably the most important person in this project was our Town Adminstrator, Pam Brenner, whose leadership and support made the project possible.

The Boccelli Garden has not changed but its setting certainly has. The new terrace can be seen at the far end of the garden.

The Grove Street end of Boccelli Garden

The far end of the garden with the terrace and Peterborough Adirondack Chairs

The terrace looking out over the lawn to the newly pruned apple tree 

The new garden below the terrace will take a couple of years to fill in.. The fence and the Nubanusit River can also been seen beyond the garden. The Grove Street Bridge can be seen in the distance.

The terrace and Peterborough Chairs

A pair of Peterborough Chairs are on order to be placed at the granite table under the apple tree. The property across the Nubanusit River, that prompted the project, can be seen behind the apple tree.

Boccelli Garden: the Continuation of a Public/Private Partnership Project III

The shrubs arrived yesterday. Yours truly moving a clethra shrub from the truck to the garden. The shrubs, landscaping, terrace and tree pruning were a private donation. The town paid for the new fence.

The Public Works Department provided much of the labor to plant the shrubs and water them. Volunteers have designed and will maintain the gardens. Here Lenny and Mike from the town, unload a yew shrub for the project.

The majority of the shrubs have been planted.

Four Taxus media 'Hicksii' will create a wall perpendicular to the retaining wall behind The Boccelli Garden.

Shrubs below the retaining wall. The herbaceous layer will be planted in the next two weeks.

A view from the terrace to the new building across the Nubanusit River.

The newly pruned apple tree in the park

Boccelli Garden as seen from the new terrace

The first two photographs are courtesy of Shelley Osborne

Boccelli Garden: the Continuation of a Public/Private Partnership Project II

Today the site was graded and hydroseeded.

Tomorrow shrubs arrive to be planted below the retaining wall. Stephandra incisa 'Crispa' and Taxus baccata 'Repandens' were chosen to help hold up the steep bank beyond the garden and nestle the retaining wall into the land. Plants including Clethra anifolia, Hydrangea anomala petiolaris and Fothergilla major 'Mt Airy' were selected to echo and harmonize with existing plantings at the adjacent park, Putnam Park, and the newly renovated building across the Nubanusit River that prompted the project.

Boccelli Garden: the Continuation of a Public/Private Partnership Project I

While I was in England, work was done to Putnam Park II  and the Boccelli Garden. The town has collaborated with a private donor to enhance the park. A new retaining wall has been added to the park to create a level space for a terrace next to the Boccelli Garden.

The apple tree that Michael Boccelli planted probably 70 years ago has been limbed up and shaped. Along the river, a new iron fence replaced an unsightly chain-link fence.

A new bluestone terrace has been added adjacent to the Boccelli Garden.

Soon work will be done to re-grade the park and planting will be added to the park on the opposite side of the new terrace.

Boccelli Garden: The Public/Private Partnership

 The Boccelli Garden is located on a small triangular plot along the Nubanusit River on Grove Street. Across the river, an old building is being beautifully renovated into a multi-use facility. There will be retail space, a bakery, condominiums and office space. The owners wanted to enhance their view of Boccelli Garden from their property and offered to partner with the town to make improvements including replacing a chain-link fence, cleaning out brush obscuring views into the river, building a retaining wall and new shrub garden and adding a bluestone patio adjacent to the Boccelli Garden.

There was a house and barn once owned by the Boccelli family in the first half of the 1900's where the garden is now located. I believe theses steps once joined the driveway to the barn. I have always admired them. Maude Odgers, a Parks Committee member and volunteer gardener, suggested that we put a patio and seating area in this spot.

Below the patio, a shrub garden was planned here.

This is a view from the Boccelli Garden to the property across the river. There is an unattractive chain-link fence along the river. Volunteer trees have obscured the view of the Nubanusit River.

 

This was the view of the Boccelli Garden from across the river.

Large equipment was required for the job.

The abutter donated granite to be used to make a retaining wall to form a terrace for the new patio.

All the scrub trees were removed along the river when the fence was dismantled. This is the view from the bridge on Grove Street. The ancient apple tree, planted by Michael Boccelli nearly 100 years ago, is nowa central feature to the park. Later in the season, tree work will be done to limb it up to enhance views from every direction.

Temporary Safety fencing was installed.

Excavation work was done near the stairs. The granite bench was relocated to the edge of the Nubanusit River.

The new retaining wall in progress.

A look from the street.

The new fence as seen from across the river.

The sand base layer to the bluestone patio.

The view of the apple tree from the patio. Note the granite bench was relocated by the river's edge in the middle of the photograph.

The fence looks handsome and the Boccelli Garden is now visible from across the river.

This is the same view from the other side of the river as the fifth photograph.

From the bridge: the retaining wall, the Boccelli Garden and Michael Boccelli's apple tree.

We have been extremely fortunate to have repeated pattern of private underwriting like this in our public spaces here in Peterborough. Private donations, grants and public investment feed off one another to create unique and beautiful public spaces and the volunteers work diligently to keep them maintained at the highest level possible.