Lotusland
Lotusland | |
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Type | Botanical garden |
Location | Montecito, California |
Coordinates | 34°26′35″N 119°39′25″W / 34.4430°N 119.6570°W |
Area | 37 acres (15 ha; 0.058 sq mi) |
Ganna Walska Lotusland, also known as Lotusland, is a
History
Ralph Kinton Stevens purchased the land in 1882; he and his wife, Caroline Lucy Tallant, named the property "Tanglewood". They established a lemon and palm nursery and eventually added other tropical plants to the collection and were among the early plantsmen of Santa Barbara.
In 1916 the estate was sold to the Gavit family, from
The gardens were created over four decades by opera singer Madame Ganna Walska, who owned the property as a private residence from 1941 until her death in 1984.[1] She was assisted in landscape planning and garden design by Peter Riedel, Ralph Stevens,[2] Lockwood DeForest, and Joseph Knowles.[citation needed] The garden was opened to the public in 1993.[1]
Gardens
This section needs additional citations for verification. (January 2017) |
The Lotusland estate grounds contain several distinct gardens, including:[3]
The Blue Garden
Featuring plants with silvery to blue-gray foliage, including Blue Atlas Cedar (
Bromeliads gardens
Butterfly gardens
Featuring varieties of flowering plants that support butterflies and other insects.
The Cactus Garden
Cacti and euphorbias gardens
The Cycad Garden
Lotusland has over 900 specimens of cycads, with nine of the eleven living genera and more than half of the known species represented. The collection includes three Encephalartos woodii, among the world's rarest cycads and extinct in the wild.[4]
Fern gardens
Featuring many types of ferns, such as Australian Tree Ferns (Sphaeropteris cooperi) and giant staghorn ferns (Platycerium). Other shade-loving plants such as angel trumpet tree (Brugmansia), calla lily (Zantedeschia), clivia hybrids and a collection of Hawaiian Pritchardia palms are present.
The Japanese Garden
A small
style.Orchards collections
- Citrus orchard (oranges, lemons, limes, kumquat, grapefruit, and guava)
- Deciduous orchard, with 100 fruit trees (including peach, plum, apple, pear, persimmon and fig) and olive trees from the 1880s.
The Parterre Garden
Formal planting beds and brick walkways with two central
Succulent gardens
A variety of
The Topiary Garden
Tropical gardens
Featuring orchid cacti (Epiphyllum), gingers (both Alpinia and Hedychium) and bananas both ornamental (Ensete) and edible (Musa).
The Water Garden
See also
- List of botanical gardens in the United States
- North American Plant Collections Consortium
References
- ^ a b c Rosemary McClure (May 2, 2015). "Lotusland in Montecito has beautiful and tranquil grounds". Los Angeles Times.
- ^ Pioneer Profiles and Biographies. "Ralph Stevens (1882 - 1958)" The Cultural Landscape Foundation, Washington, D.C. USA
- ^ "The Gardens". Ganna Walska Lotusland. Retrieved 25 January 2017.
- ^ Hayes, Virginia and Timbrook, Steven. Lotusland Collections and Horticulture. Companion Press, 2007, p.11
Further reading
- Adams, Brian (2015) [2014]. Ganna: Diva of Lotusland. CreateSpace. ISBN 978-1-5141-6957-5.