Lilies in the City

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Barbara Barenholtz is a world traveler with a professional background in both retailing and real estate. “She’s very elegant,” says landscape architect Matt Moynihan. “Her home is in tune with her taste.”

So when Barbara asked Matt to transform her small Clayton backyard into a special garden 10 years ago, he was happy to create what he calls a “little gem.”

“I had just come back from a trip to England,” Barbara recalls. “I was inspired by the Cotswold gardens. I wanted something low- maintenance, geometric and classical.”

Barbara and her husband Milton Hieken already had a lovely deck that adjoined the sunroom of their home. The sunroom, decorated with a restful color palette by Kris Keller of The Design Source Ltd., included a slate-topped Knoll table and vintage steel wire chairs by Harry Bertoia. Barbara kept the look she loved inside her home and transferred it outdoors. More wire chairs, a wonderful wire bench encircling a mature oak that protrudes through the deck, and simple striped fabrics set the tone for the garden furnishings. Planters and window boxes softened the rough brick exterior of the residence that abuts the deck.

Matt saw his task as tying the deck to the remaining garden space and creating a “little postage stamp formal garden that was simple, elegant and peaceful.”

In addition, he had one other critical charge; to incorporate a contemporary “box within a box” metal sculpture by Kent Addison into the design of the garden. Barbara purchased the piece, titled “Maternity,” a number of years ago when the artist was teaching at Maryville University.

There was no question regarding the color scheme of the garden. “I love anything white,” Barbara declares.

Matt’s first step was to open up the deck and make a broader entrance to the garden. In addition, he flanked each side of the two-step entrance with a deck-height retaining wall and planter boxes that literally brought the garden onto the deck. The rear of the courtyard-style space also came alive with a wall of white-blossomed climbing hydrangea.

The sculpture became the “set piece” to control the color and the architectural lines of the garden. Working with its box-like design, Matt “paved” the center of the landscape with squares of bluestone, centered with soft tufts of fluffy green liriope minor. 

Referring to the center space as a “lawn panel,” Matt suggests that the flat plane of the area, coupled with the constant green of the grass-like foliage, acts in the same way as a pool, serving as a resting place for the eye and creating a feeling of serenity and calm. “Ordered spaces give us a respite  from the cacophony around us,” he says. 

Around the outside of the lawn panel, Matt left space for a border of white flowering annuals and perennials such as impatiens, begonias, variegated vinca vine, silver-leaved dusty miller, hosta and astilbe. But to Barbara, the highlights of her garden are the pristine, white ‘Casa Blanca’ lilies that Matt suggested she add to the border. Their midsummer blossoms flourish in the dappled sunlight of the space, and their beauty adds both elegance and fragrance to the garden. To achieve the maximum impact, Barbara treats the lilies as annuals and plants new bulbs each year.

While Barbara loves her garden by day, one of her favorite times to be outdoors is on a soft summer night, with candles providing the only light and white flowers standing out against the darkness.

“Whether a garden is contemporary or traditional, and regardless of its scale, ordered spaces give people a place for themselves,” Matt concludes.