Click here to download the map for the 2019 Placitas Garden Tour
1. Small Potatoes Garden
Subdivision: Rural Area North of 165 & West of the Village
Address: 26 Camino Del Torreon
Owners: Suzanne Maxwell and John Kail
Garden Type or Features: Permaculture; rural; large geodesic dome green house for three season gardening; shared food growing “Co Grow” project concept
Description: Suzanne and John promote and practice the principles of “Permaculture” or “Sustainability” in garden practice and philosophy through interaction with their landscape environment and other gardeners. They employ gardening practices that use water and other resources sparingly and manage to give back to the earth to rebuild. Their planted garden landscape co-exists with the area native and native adapted plants and animals. They love the art of slow cooking using their organically grown produce. Click here to read more.
2. Huertas Canyon Farm
Subdivision: Las Huertas Canyon
Address: 12 Camino Lucero (Lower garden property marked by “Huertas Canyon Farm” banner)
Owners: Scott Deuel and Nancy Kellum-Rose
Garden Type or Feature: Working family vegetable garden/ farmers market produce / composting demo/ vegetable gardening education displays.
Description: Scott and Nancy moved to Placitas over a decade ago from the City of Chicago, where they maximized their urban growing space by creating a roof top vegetable garden. They purchased a lot of land on Lucero road just north of the Village of Placitas in 2007. While waiting for their home to be built, Scott started manually clearing a small farming area just north of their home site. At that time the area consisted of several one seeded juniper trees and a couple of unattended fruit trees. Click here to read more.
3. El Jardine en Equilibrio
Subdivision: Diamond Tail
Address: 104 Wild Primrose
Owners: Erin and John Height
Garden Type or Features: A sense of balance was achieved in this garden through the selection of plants providing a range of height, textures and colors. The owners have added their personal garden additions through the years to enhance their basic “homescape” professional design.
Description: A large engraved boulder with the number “104” marks this Wild Primrose property. Several established prickly pear, red yucca, and agave succulents grace the entry boulder. The driveway leads up to the front courtyard and then a 3-car garage entry pad. The front serviceable entrances to the home were built to take in the east Sandia mountain view. Native planted apache plum, red yucca grass, agaves and existing one seeded juniper trees anchor the foreground to the mountain view. Click here to read more.
4. The Accessible Garden
Subdivision: Diamond Tail
Address: 131 Diamond Tail Road
Owners: Shelly and Herman Haase
Garden Type or Features: Ergonomic and wheelchair accessible raised vegetable garden beds; grey water 4 stage septic treatment system; 360-degree landscape developed and maintained by the owners. Dog friendly landscape.
Description: Three years ago, Herman believed he could be again confined to a wheelchair after his disability. He did not want to give up on his vegetable gardening and access to fresh greens for cooking. Herman is unable to perform gardening in a normal on the ground manner due to his disability of over 20 years. Shelly and Herman planned for this eventuality by building a sidewalk ramp to an elevate side yard area near their garden utility storage room. The elevated space was flattened to accommodate several raised garden beds accessible from wheelchair height. There is a wheelchair turn around area between the raised garden beds. Click here to read more.
5. The Infinity Garden
Subdivision: Diamond Tail
Address: 109 Crestview Court
Owners: Chris and Dave Pasero
Garden Type or Features: Excellent landscape design and implementation achieved by collaboration between owner and designers; large infinity pool patio garden with view of the Ortiz Mountains. Rick Garcia of Landscape Solutions expert presence at the garden to advise tour guests.
Description: The garden name refers to the outdoor pool design and how it draws your eye to the far northern mountain range view. The front open landscape was done so well that you may not realize that the house was built less than 3 years ago. The front hardscape design is functional and visually stunning encompassing the choice of rock colors, the dry river bed construction, and the placement of petroglyph carved boulders throughout. Click here to read more.
6. The Labyrinth Garden
Subdivision: Diamond Tail
Address: 107 Crestview Court
Owners: Jessica and Mike Chynoweth
Garden Type or Features: Open space labyrinth, water harvesting; family w/ children and dogs use friendly garden. Hunter of Waterwise Landscapes expert presence at the garden to advise tour guest
Description: When Jessica and Mike purchased this house some years ago there was very little landscaping. They just had a baby and wanted to create a safe and beautiful place for her to play. They worked with Hilltop Landscaping to put in the initial wall, hardscape, plantings, and water features. Over the years Jessica added a few plants such as the butterfly bushes. The labyrinth came about when they needed to relocate their septic tank. Click here to read more.
7. The Zen Garden
Subdivision: Diamond Tail
Address: 110 Buffalo Ridge Road
Owners: Oddie and Juanita Brown
Garden Type or Features: The owner personally designed and landscaped the property in the Zen philosophy of garden design in coordination with the natural setting. The back-yard water pond rock feature was built over a period of 3 months by the owner.
Description: Speaking with Oddie about landscaping is an entertaining lesson on the art and philosophy of Zen garden design. Odie was trained and influenced as a young man in garden maintenance and landscape design by Yashiro Yamada while growing up in Englewood, a suburb on the south side of Chicago. Yashiro was the high school football coach of Englewood High School. Oddie is both artist and landscape designer. He always starts with a clean slate to develop one of his landscape masterpieces. He explained that to develop a garden is like developing a body. First you must have a skeleton, which is the rock or hardscape in the garden. For this Oddie brought in large boulders and moved them in place by hand to create the irregular mountain outcropping structures in the landscape surrounding his home. Next you must have the skin, which is the soil and water. For this Oddie used both native and amended soils and created waterfall and ponding features in his landscape. Click here to read more.
8. Sangre de Agua Garden
Address: 18 Sangre de Christo
Subdivision: San Francisco Hills Road
Owners: Art Martinez and Delores
Garden Type or Features: Mountain home retreat garden. Large resort style sand stone water fall feature built by the owner over a period of several years. Transplanted Mount Taylor conifer trees – blue spruce, ponderosa, and aspen. Beautiful fall country drive to this garden via Camino San Francisco just west of Diamond Tail. There is a very good possibility of seeing the Placitas wild horses grazing off the roadside. Drive slowly and carefully on the San Francisco Road and enjoy the wildlife of Placitas.
Description: The Martinez family is fond of their cozy home and rural landscape in the San Francisco Hills neighborhood of far northwestern Placitas. There is a view of the Sangre de Christo mountain range in the far distance looking out of their driveway. Delores and Art feel like they are on vacation when they are at home and particularly so when they are sitting on their portal listening to the water fall and aspen leaves rustling. The water fall is the focus of this property. It is a resort sized rock wall built by hand with collected lime stone. It took Art six years to build the rock feature and then after that he chiseled out some of the lower stone to insert a carved bird bath. It is a great location for growing trees nearby and enticing wild life and birds to the water. Sometimes the wild horses of Placitas will congregate at the upper level of the water fall leaving their hoof prints in the sandy loam soil. It has also become a family and friend gathering spot. Just a few years ago their son was married under the trellis covered with Virginia creeper against the back drop of the stone water fall. Click here to read more.
