Norfolk -- Fernwood

The Fernwood Garden, located in Norfolk, Connecticut, was originally designed in 1908 as an intimate summer garden for Elizabeth Farnum, a woman from a prominent New Haven family. Farnum enlisted her friend, Marian Coffin—one of the first women to graduate with a landscape architecture degree from MIT—to create a garden that almost feels like an extension of the English Arts and Crafts style house designed by architect Alfredo S.G. Taylor. The garden was carefully planted in a mauve, pink, and purple color scheme, featuring phlox, gladiolus, Japanese iris, snapdragons, heliotrope, verbenas, hollyhocks, and asters. Over time, much of the original garden was lost. When current owners acquired the property, they undertook extensive research and uncovered photos and original plans from a 1922 issue of Country Life magazine, which helped guide their restoration. Seedlings were harvested from remaining privet hedges on the property to preserve the original plant varieties. The restored garden retains the original square design south of the house, with a new circular flower bed centered by a sundial replacing the original pool. Eight arborvitae punctuate the paths, while benches serve as focal points at the end of vistas, honoring Coffin's vision. A bust of Hercules atop a stone pedestal anchors one end of a long border surrounded by Nine Bark shrubs. In 2015, a pergola with a gabled top echoing the house's lines was added at the north end of this border, supporting native Clematis and set upon a newly created stone terrace with a low wall to level the site. The garden's terracing takes advantage of the sloping terrain, with the mid-level square garden enclosed by privet hedges on three sides and a stone retaining wall on the fourth. Originally overlooked by an open loggia (now screened), the garden features stone steps, restored paving, and cross paths that improve access and aesthetics. The bottom-level garden includes a double border separated by a wide grass path, blending flowers and shrubs to tie the landscape to the house's base. Throughout its evolution, the Fernwood Garden has been thoughtfully recreated and reimagined, balancing historical fidelity with the preferences of current owners. It remains an intimate and carefully maintained landscape reflecting the early 20th-century Arts and Crafts style and Coffin's pioneering work in landscape architecture. Persons associated with the garden's design: Marian Coffin (garden designer, 1908); Elizabeth Farnum (former owner, inception-unknown); Roger D. Mitchell (owner, 2002- ).