When speaking with Georgia Glassford you can instantly feel her enthusiasm for the greenspace that surrounds her. The gardens at her Poplar Street home earned her the award for Most Improved Garden from the Townsite Heritage Society at the end of 2019.
Originally from Gibsons, her family is related to founder George Gibson. Georgia has been in Powell River since 2005 and purchased her heritage home, which was built in 1914, six years ago.
Georgia’s love of gardening came from family.
“My grandmother was a gardener and my mom has a green thumb,” she said.
Her mom is originally from Sweden and was taught Latin in school, so she taught Georgia the scientific names of the plants. This led to Georgia obtaining a horticultural diploma from Kwantlen University and an 11-year career in the field.
“I did it for so many years, and then I kind of lost my love for it because it was just a job and so I stopped doing it,” she said. “Now it’s back.”
When she isn’t busy working at her current job in health care or chasing after her energetic six-year-old son Lyndon, Georgia can be found out in the garden.
Originally there was nothing but grass in the front yard, essentially providing her with a blank canvas. It is now home to evergreen deciduous shrubs and striking seven-foot-tall lilies, which add privacy from the street.
Along the side of the house she planted a cedar hedge that provides a backdrop for her flowerbeds leading to the backyard. It’s here where visitors will find pink and white bleeding hearts, hostas, astilbe and a purple columbine from one of her clients she grew from seed. A giant Buddleia or butterfly bush stands tall beside the kitchen window.
The majority of Georgia’s plants have been selected to attract butterflies, hummingbirds and birds.
“I want everything, I want an ecosystem,” she said. “You can’t have one without the other, so [I have] safe places for them and trees.”
She also chooses plants for their scent, such as lilies, peonies and her five different kinds of deciduous azaleas. Georgia says she has something blooming 12 months out of the year.
“It’s a process, this is my art,” she added. “It’s very calming.”
In the backyard a variegated climbing hydrangea with mottled leaves wraps around the deck. There are white snowdrops, black mondo grass and a blue star creeper Georgia describes as a tiny carpet of light blue, star-shaped flowers that bloom for months.
She jokes that she can’t drive by a nursery without coming home with something new. On one trip to Vancouver Island Georgia returned with her car full of perennials, shrubs and even managed to squeeze in a Magnolia tree.
Along with most of the plants people are familiar with, Georgia has acquired some unique greenery. Beside the fence stands a dwarf strawberry tree that is actually a type of Arbutus. It blooms with white flowers in the spring that are followed by small, strawberry-like fruit that is actually edible. She also has a weeping white pine that remains in the pot because she says it would be too hard to leave behind if she were to ever move.
While most of the gardens contain perennials she does grow peas with her son, strawberries, blueberries, dill, basil, garlic and rosemary. There are future plans to build some raised planter beds for growing more vegetables and hopes for a meditation area that currently contains some bonsai trees.
Georgia has grown an impressive 20-year-old Shishigashira Maple with leaves smaller than a dime. In planning out the gardens, she said she has tried to keep the entire yard as low maintenance as possible with very little pruning, deadheading and watering.
“Once the plants are established you don’t have to water much,” she added. “You come out every three or four days; when it’s hot you might have to do it every other day.”
This is smart planning for a woman who barely seems to have enough time in the day and realized last summer she doesn’t have seating areas outside or on the deck “because I never sit down,” she says, laughing.
When asked if she has a favourite flower she says it’s too hard to choose, although she has a fondness for her 15 varieties of hellebores that range from dark purple to delicate pale pink.
In Swedish culture it’s tradition to get flowers on your birthday, so every March Georgia’s older sister Karin makes her a traditional Prinsesstårta (princess) cake decorated with hellebores.
Gardening season has now arrived and anyone who enjoys getting their hands dirty will understand what Georgia is talking about when she says: “You feel it and it develops, it’s literally a living thing.”
