Columbia -- Elsie's Garden

This 54 x 125 foot formal Charleston-style walled garden was established by the current owners in 2000 after having purchased the property in 1997. It was designed and built by Elsie Owens on a narrow urban lot and was influenced by the architectural style of Italianate gardens. Each garden room is contrasted by plant material, texture, and shape, as well as areas of light and shade. The high brick wall that surrounds the garden is covered in a layer of creeping fig and lady banks' rose. A large yellow Lady Banksia obscures a corner of the wall. The sidewalk from the street enters through a rose-covered arch into the small front courtyard garden that features a wall fountain depicting a face spilling water out of its open mouth. This garden room is enclosed on three sides with creeping fig once covering the cement. Large clay pots containing fern, white impatiens, and variegated ivy flank the fountain with dense boxwoods on either side. The ground in this area shows stone steps peeking through overgrown grass. Blue salvias line the base of the fountain.

Podocarpus hedges and an arch covered in Lady Lanks' Rose lead to the central fountain garden room. Square stone steps create a path to the circular cherub fountain lined with clipped boxwoods positioned at the center of the narrow garden. The steps continue past the fountain through podocarpus hedges that mark the entrance to the back lawn, featuring a covered patio to the right. Across from the patio is a brick-edged bed containing aspidistra, holly fern, hosta, lamb's ear, and hellebores. One side of the lawn features a dense, semicircle bed with ilex latifolia that surrounds a cast iron statue of a child with a butterfly in the center. The bed is also filled with peonies in concrete urns, hydrangea paniculata, deutzia, and ajuga reptans. Hidden between the statue and the boxwoods are steppingstones leading to a small secret garden, made for the owner's first grandchild. Here there are small garden sculptures of frogs, rabbits, and turtles. On the walls are pots with ferns and a bas relief of cherubs. A path to the right of the back garden leads to a small area featuring a red Japanese maple and a statue of Buddha.

Persons associated with the garden include: Forest Lake Duplex Partnership (former owner, 1982); Dr. James C. Owens (former owner, 1997); Elsie T. Owens (former owner, 2007 and architect, designer, gardener and builder, 1997-2015).