I ushered in fall by visiting my friend, Charles Cresson, at his Swarthmore home and garden, Hedgleigh Spring, on a crisp, sunny afternoon.
Cresson, a horticulturist and author whose garden has been featured in several magazines and who has hosted innumerable tours to his historic property, greeted me at the door like any gardener – in mid-project.
Taking a seat in his kitchen, I watched him pot up a salvia seedling he had started as a cutting from a plant in his backyard. Once he finished watering it with the sink sprayer, he turned his head and said, "Watch what I do now."
Lifting the pot onto the counter next to the sink, he ripped a piece of paper towel, twisted it and placed it in one of the drainage holes at the bottom. As the paper hung over the side of the sink, he explained, "The capillary action wicks the water away from the bottom of the pot and it will drip into the sink below. It keeps soil from becoming soggy around the roots."
Cresson's solution to root rot was classic Charles – methodical and brilliant. I was impressed without even seeing the garden, a pleasure delayed as we embarked on a quick local tour.
Part of Hedgleigh Spring's attraction is its history. Cresson and I circled the neighborhood as he pointed out his great-grandfather's house, built in 1883. We drove along Cresson Lane, a reminder that his family owned a good bit of property in Swarthmore, including a 40-acre farm.
Cresson lives in the house his grandfather built about a century ago; once part of the farm, it includes the original spring house, and Crum Creek runs along the back of the property. Before returning to his house, we stopped by his brother's around the corner where we peeked at an enormous steel gate built to look like a fortress door. His brother made it for him to place in the garden.
"I really have to move that soon, but I can't decide on a finish," he said.
Back at Hedgleigh, where Cresson is steward to the heritage of his forefathers, he points out the stumps of some towering oaks that have tumbled over the years. An enormous slab left behind by a 200-year-old tree is now part of a sunny garden next to the house. Its loss transformed a shady area into a "subtropical terrace" and a large scree garden filled with sand and rocks from the banks of Crum Creek.
Dozens of unusual plants, including a fuchsia with edible fruits we nibble along the way, thrive in the new light. Two magnificent climbing roses along the house wall reach to the second floor. One of them, "Madame Gregoire Staechelin," was planted by his grandfather and its downward-hanging flowers have given way to enormous hips that look like small apples.
The garden is a collector's paradise, home to extinct species, cultivars not yet introduced into the trade, a large vegetable garden, and exotics like yellow-flowering banana. Every season reveals something new and early fall, it turns out, was a bonanza for colchicum, a large crocus-like flower that blooms in lovely pink pockets throughout the property, including species large, small and checkered. It's also the season for tall annual salvias, which are especially dramatic in the long, curving flower border.
"I based it on Graham Stuart Thomas' color border at Wisley," Cresson says, referring to the Royal Horticultural Society's famous English garden. The color-coordinated border goes from hot to cool colors, mixing the salvias with cannas, dahlias, perennials and annuals. In the afternoon light, it dazzled against a lush green lawn.
Since the 1980s, Cresson has rebuilt all the stone walls and steps, moved mountains of compost, and carved a meadow into the wild area by the creek. He propagates many of the plants himself, and moves dozens of non-hardy varieties inside for the winter, a daunting task.
As the growing season winds down, his garden still looks spectacular, a reflection of his care and planning. And just before I leave, he grabs the hose to water the plants on his terrace. There's a tour coming from England in early October, after all.
Moira Sheridan is a Wilmington freelance writer and gardener. Reach her at masher9@juno.com.
5 THINGS TO DO IN THE GARDEN THIS WEEK
• Continue to reseed and revitalize lawns.
• Begin planting bulbs, but wait the longest to plant tulip bulbs. As long as the ground is workable, you can plant.
• Fill in bare spots with fall-blooming perennials.
• Plant trees and shrubs and water in well.
• Start moving houseplants indoors when temperatures fall below 50 degrees at night.
