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LakeForestLeader.com NEWS
the lake forest leader | August 24, 2017 | 11
Late Summer Garden Stroll shows
sights of more than 100 years ago
Submitted by Lake Forest
Historic Preservation
Foundation
It’s not often that you
find an estate garden that
was originally designed
and then updated almost
100 years later by two different
men who share the
same design philosophy.
The personal garden of
Ann and Cliff Miller, originally
designed by O.C. Simonds,
is just such a place
and will be featured by
the Lake Forest Preservation
Foundation at its Late
Summer Garden Stroll on
Aug. 25.
The garden sits on just
under an acre of the Byron
Laflin Smith estate and
arboretum, which in the
1880s originally stretched
from Lake Michigan to
Sheridan Road. Appropriately,
the Millers’ home
was an estate gardener’s
residence. Cliff said that
when he and his wife,
Ann, moved there, the garden
was a blank slate with
a stand of pines and a neglected
collection of trees.
Cliff’s background in art
and sculpture carries over
to his landscape design.
“I like to sculpt with
land and am a big fan of
getting a feel for the space
by spending a lot of time
there before I begin,” Cliff
said.
Over the last ten years,
Cliff has created a wide
variety of garden spaces
on their property, inspired
by landscape architect Beatrix
Farrand’s work.
“Beatrix taught me that
an area can look a lot bigger
by chopping it up into
many different spaces or
rooms, using hedges to delineate
and define certain
spaces,” Cliff said.
This is one of the sites guests will see during the
Garden Stroll n Aug. 25. Photo submitted
Cliff likes to develop
natural habitats or “communities”
in each garden
room, which stems from
a teenage love of amphibians
and his terrarium
creations for those pets.
There are many rooms in
their garden, each focused
on a different habitat, complete
with plants, rocks,
and of course as Cliff says,
“beasties.”
Cliff loves to listen to
and watch the toads and
bullfrogs on the lily pads
in the koi pond as they liven
up that “room,” making
it naturally authentic. Other
rooms include a woodland
space, a formal rose
garden, ornamental shade
area, and even a rain garden
that slows, filters and
stores storm water.
Simonds, the original
designer, was a preeminent
“landscape gardener”,
as he preferred to be
called, in the early 1900s.
Simonds was known as
a committed defender of
the natural American landscape
and believed that the
best design is inspired by
the natural landforms on
the site, and then executed
using indigenous plants.
Following in Simonds’
footsteps, Cliff takes a similar
approach and is very
well known for his design
and construction management
work on many private
and public gardens, including
the formal garden at
David Adler’s Italian villa
on Lake Road, the naturalistic
ravine edges and reforestation
at Lake Forest College,
and the superlative
restoration work at Forest
Park. Cliff is currently the
Design Director at Mariani
Landscape, adding range
and depth in composition,
horticulture, and ecology
to the firm’s strong mix of
competencies.
The Late Summer Garden
Stroll will be held on
Friday, Aug. 25 from 5:30 –
7:30 p.m. and advance reservations
are required. For
more info or to purchase a
ticket, please go to www.
LFPF.org or call (847) 234-
1230. Tickets for LFPF
members are $20 and for
non-members, $30.
For more information,
please contact Marcy Kerr,
LFPF Executive Director,
at (847) 234-1230.
Family
Vacation
Entries due 5 p.m.
Thursday, Aug. 31.
Photo
Contest
The Lake ForesT Leader
Submit your
best photo
from this year's
summer vacation
Send your photo and name to Editor Alyssa Groh
at alyssa@lakeforestleader.com
Winner
receives a prize
from a local
merchant