Garden Walk returns for 30th year

The Friends of the Oak Park Conservatory and the Garden Club of Oak Park & River Forest are back with their thirtieth annual Garden Walk on Sunday, June 23. Other than a pandemic year break, the two groups have been sharing local gardens every summer since 1993. This year’s walk includes eight private gardens in Oak Park and River Forest.

Mary Ellen Warren, historian of the Garden Walk, noted that the walk was founded by former Garden Club president, Patricia Leavy, with the idea that the proceeds would be used to fund yearly scholarships for college students majoring in horticulture, conservation, environmental studies, forestry, landscape design or botany. She reached out to Elvira Rubinstein, president of FOPCON, to see if they wanted to join in hosting the walk because the two groups had similar missions.

Today, with their share of the walk’s profits, the Garden Club sponsors three $3,000 scholarships to OPRF students through the Oak Park and River Forest Community Foundation.

FOPCON uses their share of the walk proceeds to support projects that benefit the Conservatory, which offers educational and recreational programs for children and adults.

This year’s Garden Walk is chaired by Sue Boyer, who has been co-chair since 2006, and Gina Sennello, has been co-chair since 2015.

Garden Spotlights

Diane Deckert’s Oak Park garden is one of the eight gardens featured on this year’s garden walk. She said it’s ironic that her love of gardening landed her garden on the walk.

“I grew up in Kansas on a big farm, and I hated gardening and picking potato bugs off plants,” she said.

When she moved to her ranch house in Oak Park in 2002, there was a lot of ivy, which came with a lot of spiders. She wanted to look out at something that wasn’t ivy and grass, so shortly after she moved in, she enlisted Sharon Patchak-Layman to help with the landscaping.

Patchak-Layman oversaw the planting of paper birch trees, laid out the garden beds and installed the patio. They also installed a pond with a small waterfall. Deckert said the fish used to swim up to her when she came home.

“It was a just a way to feel like we weren’t in the city,” she said.

Over the years, she has added more to the garden so that she always has something to look at in all four seasons.

 “I garden to feel a connection with nature, and I don’t want to watch grass,” she said.

Although she is a self-taught gardener, Deckert’s love of gardening has led to a second career as a landscape designer. 

She said that her yard isn’t too large — Garden Walk committee members told her it fit in the “small but charming category.”

 That small size can be an inspiration for people in Oak Park who might not have the largest yards, she adds. “People need to understand, you don’t need a huge space, and your garden can happen over time.”

In River Forest, Elyse and David Cutler have been transforming their yard for almost five years.  They had worked with Sean Kelly from Reveal Design on their previous home, but when they moved to a lot that was almost half an acre, they had to rethink their yard once again. Then, add in the fact that Covid-19 hit shortly after they moved in, and the Cutlers wanted a yard they could really live in. Kelly suggested extending an existing porch to add a grill and outdoor dining area.

The retained the original firepit at the back of the property and had Kelly design a new gas-fueled firepit closer to the outdoor kitchen area.

The Cutlers prioritized leaving their yard unfenced as, historically, their yard flowed with that of their neighbor. Elyse Cutler said that their home was originally built for the daughter of their next-door neighbors, which is one of the older homes in River Forest. 

Elyse Cutler said she’s an avid vegetable gardener. 

“I really wanted to be able to grow vegetables without feeding the deer,” she said.

They left the yard unfenced except for the vegetable beds, which are protected from the wildlife.

In addition to vegetables and beds of perennials, Elyse Cutler said, their yard is home to oak, dogwood and Japanese maple trees.

Other gardens featured on this year’s walk include the Oak Park garden of Paola Ribaudo Pickrell and Charles Pickrell, who have been working on their Oak Park garden since 2002. With the help of McAdam Landscaping, they created a classic Italian garden which they said is a four-season oasis. 

In River Forest, Tun Rattan’s garden will be featured for the second time; she was also on the Garden Walk in 1999. Over the years, she has adapted her garden to her stage in life. From a riotous mix of colors, her yard has morphed into a more minimalist landscape that focuses on textures and different shades of green. She said her garden is her “palette and joy.”

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