Building a Garden

This past weekend was exciting and fulfilling – I headed up to Peaks Island, Maine with my family to help my friends & clients Catherynne Valente & Dmitri Zagidulin install a garden I had designed for them.

Cat & Dmitri are some of the most talented and sweet people I know. Dmitri is a programmer, and excellent cook. Cat is an award winning author, and excellent cook! Naturally, they wanted to start growing some food in the huge yard of their rented home. They don’t  own the house, and may be buying a home in the next couple of years – so they didn’t want something that was going to take 5 years before it looked good. They are novice gardeners, and needed some satisfaction quickly – a place that would not only function as a practical food-growing garden, but also as a place to write, read, ruminate, and entertain their multi-talented and numerous friends.

Dmitri & Cat share a love of mythology and fairytales – Cat utilizes both in her writing, and Dmitri is always speaking of some unkown-to-me fairytale from Russia, where he emigrated from as a child. I went up in March to see the property and see how they lived. We had long talks over delicious meals, and took some gorgeous walks around the island, and I did some rough measurements.

A "panoramic" shot of the yard from the side of the house. A South facing rectangle! You can see their gorgeous German Shepard, Grimm, overlooking her domain.

A little while later, I sent them a design for a spiral labyrinth of sunflowers, arcs accented by long thing raised planting bed boxes, and diagrammatic plans to show how they could expand on the garden as time passed. They were thrilled, and so was I!

We arrived on Thursday and firmed up measurements. For rough estimates, we were only a bit off, and made adjustments accordingly. Then we sat down to an amazing dinner of grilled steak & salad with mangoes and cherries. Did I mention that both Dmitri & Cat are excellent cooks?

Putting the grid guide in with twine, bamboo stakes, flags of duct tape, and my husband.

In the morning, after some fabulous Eggs-in-the-Basket & spiced coffee, my husband and I strapped on the baby, and went out and divided up the yard into a 10’x10’ grid with twine and flags made of bamboo skewers and duct tape. Cat & her roommate went to pick up the roto-tiller while Dmitri worked from home. In the afternoon, they helped us and we finished marking the grid, and then marked the main spiral and arcs using the grid as a guide. I had made a scaled grid on the plan, we measured from there, using a scale ruler. 1” on the plan equaled 10’ on the ground. Final adjustments were made by eye and feel.

Then dinner – this time Cat made us Korean “surf n’ turf” – Korean style short ribs with shrimps thrown in at the last minute. Really fantastic!

The next morning (following mocha-raspberry pancakes and spiced coffee from Dmitri), some friends showed up and we really got to work! One friend wielded the rototiller and cut the spiral, while his wife cleared string. My husband strapped on the baby and followed with a shovel, overturning the earth, while the roommates broke up earth clumps with hand tools.

Baby backpack & overturning the earth.

My husband and I moved the stones for the storbought hearth that Cat & Dmitri had purchased while  they cut wood for the planters. I took the baby and he finished moving stones, while the baby and I and helped prep wood. Cat & I put together the ends of the planterbeds I had designed, and then the three of us made the planters. My infant son picked clover flowers and made a tidy pile.

Cat & Dmitri cut wood.

Cat & Dmitri lay the final hearthstone.

We had a quick break for cherry lemonade, gingerbeer, cookies, and hamburgers, then back to work! The spirals and arcs were finally done, and we moved the planters into place and lined them with newpaper and filled them each with 150 lbs of dirt.

Constructed raised planter beds waiting to be placed. These are 1'x7', instead of the traditional 4'x8'.

My son helps spread dirt evenly in a raised planter.

We looked at the time and realized that not only had we completed our objectives for the day – we would have time to plant! Everyone took part in the planting – mostly seeds, but a few starter plants as well.

Planted - now all we need is sun, water, and time.

Another panorama - a view from the hearth area. The building accross the street is an old-age home. We hope the residents enjoy the sunflowers when they come up!

As a reward, in the evening, we inaugurated the hearth with the guiding twine, and made s’mores while drinking beer (and while the baby slept on my lap). All in all, a fine set of work!

I can’t wait to visit in August and see how it all comes out!

View from Cat & Dmitri's bedroom window as we move into twilight, and inaugurate the hearth with the first of many fires, and warm circles of companionship!