A 3-D Garden: Delicious, Dependable, Divine
20 Sep 2013
This Mapleton retreat was made for eats.
By Sarah Warner Photos by Ecoscape Environmental Design As a young girl, Susan Linville was a 4-H gardener who grew flowers and vegetables, patiently weeded, and learned how to prepare produce in delicious ways. Her family’s farm in Urbana, Ohio, was a source of joy and fascination, and the spot where Susan discovered “how to be dedicated” to growing.
So it wasn’t a stretch when she and her husband, Kent Casper, decided to create an edible oasis at their Mapleton Hill cottage home. Both retired professors, Susan and Kent moved into their home in 1984, when grass heavily dominated the landscape.
“I got tired of mowing the lawn about a decade ago. And we’d always been gardeners, so with our retirement approaching we decided we wanted to get serious about growing things,” says Kent, who hails from Rigby, Idaho, where his family had a victory garden and raspberry patch. But unlike Susan’s family, with two brothers who still farm in Illinois, “we don’t use chemicals or Monsanto products of any kind,” Susan says of their yard. She cites the deleterious effects of monoculture agriculture, petrochemicals, pesticides and herbicides.
Kent and Susan wanted an organic, edible and sustainable garden. So in 2009, Bill Melvin of Boulder’s Ecoscape Environmental Design helped them achieve those priorities. “The best thing about working with Kent and Susan is that they were avid gardeners before the project began,” says Melvin, whose land-stewardship company focuses on integrated ecology.
“I’ve been a permaculture designer for more than 15 years,” Melvin notes. “Permaculture…is about interconnecting the dots to create a self-sufficient, sustainable landscape. Edibles are a big part of permaculture, our food being one of the biggest resources we need on this planet. Food, energy and water are essential to life.”
As gardeners and environmental stewards, Susan and Kent avidly follow the slow-food and farm-to-table culture. “I grew up eating things straight from the garden. I knew how good it could be,” says Susan, who wanted plenty of desserts—berries and other fruits—in her landscape. Obtaining food from plants “is a wonderful payoff for the use of water,” says Melvin, who designed “wall-to-wall edibles,” a bubbling water feature, and a patio, a walkway and stacked stone beds for Kent and Susan’s yard.
- A water feature, raised beds and fruit trees replaced grass in the original landscape (bottom right).
- With their vegetables now confined to raised beds, stacked-stone areas and trellises, the homeowners note the ease of harvesting, as opposed to their original vegetable garden that was planted directly into the ground.
