Manchester -- Woodholm Estate Greenhouses

Since 1964 the current owners have developed and revised their three-acre property, utilizing some of the greenhouses that were built in the 1920's. This parcel of an original larger estate was being developed for extensive gardens, with outbuildings and machinery, until the stock market crashed in 1929. The greenhouses, 200 and 160 feet long, were used by a commercial grower until the current owners made a home. A stone service building was converted into their residence, with some rooms located in the connecting greenhouse. Some greenhouses were dismantled and sold, leaving foundation walls, terrazzo paving and planting beds. A stone pediment entrance from the original design remains while the glass palm house that was behind it is gone. Now known as the Rotunda Garden this area features a koi pond, original paving, and custom curving pergolas draped with wisteria and grapevine. Starting at the driveway, oaks, maples, and spruce on one side and a granite ledge on the other side screen the property from the road. Rhododendron, arrowwood viburnum, mountain laurel, magnolia, red oak, and red maple line the driveway. At the end of the driveway the vista opens showing the length of a greenhouse complex rising from a lawn that stretches from the driveway to a two-hundred-foot-long granite retaining wall planted with climbing hydrangea, crabapple, rose of Sharon, viburnum, and smoke bush. Beyond the wall is the Wood House, built in 1970 for the children's and guest's bedrooms, and its entry garden. There is a parking area with mixed borders on three sides, with a pair of dwarf crabapples on either side of a path that leads to the main residence (the former stone service building), a 16th century Venetian marble bench, and a patio. Plants in this area include Japanese maple, hydrangeas, roses, allium, many varieties of perennials, and daffodils in spring. The formal Back Garden has clipped hedges, a small lawn, and a wall fountain from the original 1920's design. An original granite warehouse for overwintering plants was renovated in 2000, adding a second story and renaming the building Millenium Hall. A Stupa Garden was designed for a stone spire and Buddha brought back from a trip to China. An herb garden has the "Summer Showers" statue and fountain. Along the former greenhouse foundation wall is the Long Foundation Garden with flowering shrubs and arborvitae, a row of Chinese water lily basins, and Chinese elephant statues framing a staircase down to the Rotunda Garden The 1920's plans included a camellia house that was never built. In 1982 the current owner bought 200 camellias from a nursery that was closing and planted them in greenhouse beds and cold frames. A mature woodland around the property includes fir, birch, spruce, black cherry, and lowbush blueberry. Persons associated with the garden's design: Olmsted Brothers, landscape architects (circa 1926-1929); Charles Thomas, contractor and master carpenter (1990- ); Alison Grant, landscape architect (1991-1995); Denise King, landscape architect and gardener (1995-2004); Hillarie Holdsworth, garden designer (2005-2010); Jeffreys Creek Land Contractors, Inc., maintenance (2005- ); Walker Creek Gardens, maintenance (2010- ).