Proud gardeners across Cleveland will open their yards, gardens and farms for public viewing and neighborly meet-and-greets at the annual GardenWalk Cleveland this weekend.
GardenWalk Cleveland spans the entire city from East to West Sides. Gardens this year are located in these Cleveland neighborhoods:
- Broadway-Slavic Village
- Clifton-Baltic
- Collinwood
- Detroit-Shoreway
- Fairfax
- Glenville
- Hough
- Ohio City
- Little Italy
- Tremont
- West Park/Kamm’s
- West Park/Jefferson
- Old Brooklyn
Members of the public are invited to each neighborhood to take a self-guided walking tour of private gardens and green spaces . Every neighborhood has a map of participating homes. Each home will have a sign out front showing they’re a part of GardenWalk Cleveland. An information station is located in each neighborhood to help guests find restrooms and other amenities. Several neighborhoods will have other related activities like free Euclid Beach Rocket Car rides and workshops on foraging and raising backyard chickens.
GardenWalk is from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, July 11 and 12. Find printable maps and information station locations here.
Gardening as connection
GardenWalk Cleveland began in 2011 with around 200 participating gardens. Since then, it has since doubled in size, with over 400 entries this year. Organizer Casey Hill, a participating gardener from Old Brooklyn, said the goal of GardenWalk Cleveland is not just to show off individual gardens. It is to build community by introducing neighbors to each other through shared interests and intention.
“That neighborhood is stronger when people are out and about,” said Hill. “Being out tending a garden, you’re going to meet more of your neighbors, you’re going to talk about the stuff you’re planting, so we feel like that it’s encouraging that engagement, that civility. It’s a nice way to kind of segue into those relationships. It’s a casual way to meet a neighbor and see what’s going on in their backyard, and to just kind of get the ball rolling.”
Meet some of the gardeners
Vernice Smith of Fairfax
Vernice Smith runs G’s Urban Farm and Venue from the home she grew up in and now owns in Fairfax. She runs her garden in honor of her parents and her neighborhood.
“I think gardens, especially in areas … you’ve grown up in, is one way to honor your wealth,” she said, “to embrace whatever we had growing up, and so I feel rich honoring that.”
Smith is a retired teacher and regularly has children come through her farm to learn about growing food and being mindful of what they eat. She has a sensory garden specifically for kids where she regularly hosts storytellers, entrepreneurs and other community farmers.
“My goal is to recreate part of what I had [growing up]. Yes, I was in the inner city, but I had a rich childhood.”
Catherine Marquardt of Detroit-Shoreway
Catherine Marquardt said the garden at her home in the Detroit-Shoreway neighborhood is unique for the amount of shade she has.
“I have a lot of underlayer trees and taller trees in a very small space, and it gives my yard a sense of enclosure and peacefulness and serenity, and kind of helps block out the urban environment around me,” she said.
Marquardt’s garden features a koi pond with a waterfall and two fish that are 18 years old and weigh about six pounds each.
Most of the plants in her garden are shade plants, like hydrangeas, lilies and ferns. “It’s not Japanese by any stretch, but it’s all mostly about texture and color, without having all the flowers.” She uses her tree lawn, where there is more sun, for an herb garden.
Marquardt has participated in GardenWalk Cleveland every year since its inception and said she is most often asked by visitors what she does with the fish over winter. She said she uses aerators that put oxygen into the water to help keep it from freezing. “They’re pretty hardy,” she said of the koi. She will have fish food on hand this year for visitors to feed them.
“I get a lot of garden questions [too],” said Marquardt, “a lot of people that appreciate the shade when it’s so hot, because it’s about 10 degrees cooler back here.”
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Dave Horneck of West Park/Kamm’s
Dave Horneck of Chatfield Avenue in the West Park/Kamm’s neighborhood has his garden divided into separate living spaces: a living room, dining area and lounge.
Horneck has a “shabeen” in his yard: “‘Shabeen’ is an Irish word for a private, unlicensed establishment. I have a bar from the 1960s…it’s like a cozy little bar, speakeasy-type of thing. The bar is vintage orange and teal. … It’s got French doors and a window box and skylights.”
“I have some large canvases I’ve put up since, and there’s also little art pieces here and there,” he added.
Horneck said the question he gets asked most frequently by GardenWalk guests is: “Can I have a party here?” The answer is no.
Horneck’s garden features unusual plants like lantanas, a magnolia tree, elephant ears, a voodoo lily, and three Gartenmesier fuschia plants he nurtured in his basement, “so they’re a lot larger than what people are used to seeing,” he said.
Sharon Rose of Glenville
Sharon Rose’s yard features flowers, annuals and perennials that all bloom at different times so her yard is always rich and colorful.
“Everyone that comes to my backyard is intrigued with my silver maple tree,” she said. “They love the tree because I have it cut like a canopy. It covers the backyard and provides shade throughout the day.”
For the last four years, Rose has acted as a “garden finder” in her Glenville neighborhood for GardenWalk Cleveland. “I’m a community person, I love when the community gets involved,” she said. “They just may say hello, or stop and say, ‘Oh, that’s such a pretty flower,’ or the young lady yesterday that was out selling something, she told me she loved the lilies in my yard. She said, ‘Lilies are my favorite flower, I just love lilies,’ so it brings open communication with different people.”
