Fashion is fleeting, but nature endures.

So it seems appropriate that one of the lasting gifts from the recent Designer ShowHouse at the historical Perkins Stone Mansion was an enhancement of its gardens and grounds.

As decorators were transforming the inside of the mansion and the nearby John Brown House for the Junior League of Akron’s show house in June, landscape professionals and volunteers were sprucing up the outdoors. They trimmed unruly shrubs and vines, filled garden beds with flowers and even re-created a gazebo that had once shaded the descendants of original owner Simon Perkins Jr., son of Akron’s co-founder.

The animal-print throw pillows and glass-topped tables from the show house are gone now, but the fresh landscaping remains to greet visitors to the site, operated by the Summit County Historical Society.

The landscaping was inspired by history but doesn’t attempt to replicate it faithfully, said Laurie Schueler, who chaired the show house’s grounds subcommittee with fellow Junior League member Lisa Pardi. Plants were chosen that might have grown on the property sometime between 1837 to 1945, when the mansion was occupied by Perkins and his descendants. But those plants were chosen with low maintenance in mind, Pardi said, and often newer, pest-resistant varieties were substituted for heirloom plants.

The idea, Pardi said, was to blend old with new. Freshly planted flowers surround the old grape arbor and a couple of mature flowering quince bushes, for example, and a new lilac walk passes some of the property’s historically significant trees. Gloria Schreiber of Hartville’s Syringa Acres designed the walk using lilacs developed by the late Rev. John L. Fiala, a priest and horticulturist from Medina County.

Help from archivist

The Junior League got guidance in its relandscaping effort from a group of gardening and historical experts that included Kent State University archivist Steve Paschen, a former director of the historical society who researched the landscaping of the Perkins farm and mansion.

The property was originally a farm, where, Paschen said, the Perkinses raised sheep for high-grade wool and grew feed crops for their other animals. What grew on the land in the early decades would have been mostly native plants, and photos from the late 1800s show that even the mansion’s lawn was grazed rather than mowed, Paschen said.

The farm was becoming more of a formal estate by the turn of the 20th century, he said, with a manicured lawn, formal gardens beyond the wash house and ornamental shrubs around the house. At some point Perkins’ descendants added an in-ground swimming pool, but it was filled in around the time the historical society took over the estate in 1945.

Bringing in grazing sheep for the show house was a bit beyond the Junior League’s scope, but the group did resurrect some of the property’s old features. Among them was an herb garden behind the wash house, albeit a scaled-down version of the gardens of years past. The garden was planted by members of the Leaf and Blossom Garden Club and children from K-Kids, a Kiwanis-sponsored program at Portage Path Elementary School.

For many of the children, it was a first gardening experience, Schueler said. “They were just amazed that you could eat herbs, eat a plant.”

New gazebo

The most visible restoration, however, was the construction of a Greek Revival gazebo that’s nearly identical to one that stood northeast of the mansion, next to the pool. Architect David Yedidsion designed the structure based on old photos, and Canal Town Builders constructed it with materials mostly donated by Graves Lumber.

Construction was delayed by heavy rains in mid-May, and the elaborate gazebo railing turned out to be more labor-intensive than expected, said Mike Serge, a volunteer who oversaw the gazebo project. Nevertheless, a weeklong building blitz enabled the group to finish the gazebo’s shell on time for the show house’s opening gala, he said.

Another big change to the grounds is the addition of a fenced vegetable garden next to the John Brown House, the clapboard building that once housed the famous abolitionist. The garden was dug by Let’s Grow Akron, an organization that facilitates the creation of community gardens, usually on vacant lots.

Gardeners from nearby Saferstein Towers, a housing complex for elderly and disabled residents, are tending the garden, along with families from the neighborhood, said Let’s Grow Akron’s executive director, Elaine Evans. Each participant was assigned a rectangular plot within the garden to grow greens, tomatoes, peppers, beans or whatever the gardener likes, using plants purchased with grant money from the Akron Community Foundation. The grant also paid for the picket fence and garden equipment.

Saferstein resident Helen Hamman, one of about 10 from the complex who work in the garden, said it has been a welcome diversion that has lifted residents’ spirits. “We look forward to getting up in the morning, because we have our garden,” she said.

She’ll visit the plot two or three times a day, she said, sometimes just to sit and enjoy it. Already the garden has yielded radishes, green onions and kohlrabi, which the gardeners have shared with others in the building.

“It’s such a blessing,” Hamman said. “It truly is.”

Other landscaping improvements at the historical site include a bed of hydrangeas, lavender and vinca next to the Perkins Mansion, donated by Donzell’s Flower and Garden Center; trough-shaped planters made by Dave Thomas of R.G. Thomas Landscape & Design and planted with annuals from Sisters Flower Haus, which also donated flowers planted elsewhere on the grounds; a purple beech planted by Suncrest Gardens; and heritage daffodil bulbs planted along the stone wall edging the Perkins Mansion property by Seedlings Garden Club.

In addition, the Junior League raised money through sponsorships to improve the signs on the property’s historical trees with the help of Tom Hrivnak, director of horticulture at Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens. The league also develop a brochure to lead visitors on a walking tour of the trees.

Refurbishing the landscaping was an extensive project that involved many businesses, groups, Junior League members and other volunteers, Pardi and Schueler said. The hope, Schueler said, is that the work will help the historical society draw more visitors and events such as weddings.

The experience has been rewarding, Schueler said. “You just really feel like you’re working for a cause here.”

Source: www.ohio.com