Garden Restored
February - March 2009
Bask in the history and beauty of the Philpotts McGrath Garden
As charming as the idea may be, not everyone is up to the task of restoring a nearly 100-year-old garden. The property, when interior designer Mary Philpotts and her husband, John McGrath, first saw it, was certainly beautiful, fronted by the street and an ancient auwai. Then there was the back dipping down a slope covered in tangled, overgrown foliage to a rushing stream below. The new owners had their work cut out for them, and they knew it.
Philpotts and McGrath purchased the estate they call Ahuimanu in the early 1990s. The home was a three-story classic designed and built over several years by the architect Hart Wood. The McGraths is the second family ever to occupy it.
Both are avid gardeners and couldn’t wait to begin re-creating the garden’s old majesty, but in a fresher, more-contemporary way. They knew they had good backup. Whenever they felt themselves being overwhelmed by their one-acre garden, they didn’t hesitate to call in friends and garden specialists to offer advice.
The property was choking with dense foliage, thriving happily and wildly in rainy Nuuanu Valley. The trees, mostly monkeypods, had grown so large and tall they blocked the sunlight and circulating air from the garden. Mary’s garden mentor, the late May Moir, had always stressed to her the importance of circulation to keep a garden healthy and disease-free.
“One of our biggest jobs at first was to cut down some of the trees to let the light in,” Philpotts says. “We were so overpopulated with mature trees, we had to allow the under story to live.”
The view across the McGraths’ front lawn was of an ancient auwai, one of many in an old and intricate Hawaiian irrigation system in the valley. Originally intended to bring water to taro patches, rice paddies and flower farms, the auwai still flows through the neighborhood and is protected by the Department of Land and Natural Resources of the state of Hawaii.
But in reality, their view was of a small ditch running next to the mock orange hedge that fronted the street. McGrath and Philpotts reconfigured the running water into a gracefully curving stream, enlarging the area into ponds.
“The children love to fish there with just bacon and string. It’s better than anything, and keeps their interest,” says Philpotts. They finished the area with lush plantings of fern, spathiphyllum, monstera and wandering iris.
One of their biggest challenges was finding plants that could thrive under medium light levels. The valley has a tendency to cloud over and drizzle more than most places. This steered them to the use of many native species: palapalai ferns, ti plants, hapu ferns, several varieties of bromeliads and, strangely enough, begonias.
The begonias became McGrath’s passion. He estimates he has experimented with 30 to 40 different varieties. Out of vogue in Island gardens for some time, begonias have nonetheless been rich in the Islands’ history. Queen Liliuokalani even mentions planting them in her garden at Washington Place in the 19th century.
“They’re so old-fashioned,” says Philpotts. “They will grow from just the leaf or a stem, so they must have been easy to bring into Hawaii. It was such a Victorian ‘nose gay’ culture.”
With the help of David Yearian of Ti’s Unlimited in Waimanalo, McGrath installed his much-loved ti garden filled with every exotic variety, color and leaf shape. The plants are kept brilliantly colorful and layered by regular pruning and feeding. The environment takes care of the watering.
As the previous owner’s age and health declined, the back garden was completely reclaimed by nature. Restoring order was like hacking through a jungle. One day Philpotts’ son Billy started pulling away brush leading down the hillside and discovered an old pathway covered in mossy stone and terraces. Clearing them and replanting with varieties of pink ti plants and walking iris in an undulating pattern made it not only pleasing from ground level, but also looking down on it from the home above.
They began the restoration of the back by clearly defining a brick patio that runs the width of the house. Instead of planting the perimeter, they decided to make its look more flexible by installing a container garden of large and small bromeliads and potted water gardens. Then they added black, wrought iron lounge furniture for seating.
When their neighbor, the late artist Peggy Chun, wanted to get rid of a Balinese pavilion she owned, they purchased and installed it as a summerhouse on one of the larger terraces. On warm summer evenings it works perfectly for drinks or supper.
One of the last and most dramatic additions to the garden was night lighting. Older homes rarely had outdoor lighting, and so the McGraths called on lighting designers Lowell Barnhart and Brian Shuckburgh to dramatically illuminate the reconfigured auwai, crescent driveway and large trees. The result is a garden that is as animated at night as it is in daylight.
The garden is visited today by out-of-town garden clubs, and the McGraths regularly open their home for fundraisers and family entertaining. Everyone marvels at their passion and ability to maintain it, making changes as time goes by. It has been an enormous undertaking. Let it down just a little, and the rain forest will greedily reclaim it. But let’s hope it never does.
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