Some of my city’s best Old Town gardens will make their formal debut during a tour Saturday. It’s the first public outing for eight truly lovely landscapes cultivated with little or no fanfare for a decade or longer.
They’re all gorgeous but until now have been admired from afar, surreptitiously over hedges and fences or, on a lucky day, guided by a gardener taking a break between projects.
Bigger, more established tours run all season, but these gardeners are taking very seriously their role in this inaugural grassroots stroll, taming beds that are good enough for family but needed some sprucing up before the company arrives.
The evidence is everywhere.
Gardens that were spilling past their boundaries a month ago have been cut back with the discipline of a Zen master. Piles of mulch delivered curbside are slowly disappearing into blank spots in the border. Bad-mannered weeds have been ripped out and laggard plants replaced.
The gardens this week seemed a little stiff and nervous with their new haircuts and manicured edges, but there were hints in nearly open buds and just-unfurling foliage that they are ready to relax and enjoy the party. Dana Coffield, The Denver Post
Lafayette’s Old Town Garden Tour, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday; Tickets, $5, at 108 E. Simpson St.
