Asticou Azalea Garden

Last updated
Asticou Azalea Garden
Asticou Azalea 2019.jpeg
An October 2019 view across Asticou Pond from Peabody Drive
Asticou Azalea Garden
Location Route 198, Northeast Harbor, Maine
Area2.3 acres
Established1956(66 years ago) (1956)
ParkingFree, on-site
Website www.gardenpreserve.org/asticou-azalea-garden/index.html

The Asticou Azalea Garden in Northeast Harbor, Maine, United States, is a popular visitor attraction. It was created by lifelong resident of the village, Charles Kenneth Savage, in 1956. Much of the initial plant collection originated at Reef Point Estate in nearby Bar Harbor, the summer residence of renowned landscape architect Beatrix Farrand. The collection was moved with the financial assistance of John D. Rockefeller Jr., including the weeping hemlock, just north of the main bridge.

Contents

Located at the intersection of Route 198 and Route 3 (Peabody Drive), the 2.3 acres (0.93 ha) garden and its pond are open to the public during daylight hours from May 1 to October 31. [1] It features a selection of rhododendrons and azaleas, including the Rhododendron canadense , Maine's native azalea. [2] Styled after a Japanese stroll garden, the fine-gravel paths are raked regularly in a manner that suggests flowing water. There is also a sand garden, where this effect is repeated but with the addition of stones, which are meant to represent islands. [3]

Savage was also the owner of the Asticou Inn, which is located on the opposite side of Peabody Drive. [4] Prior to the establishment of the garden, the Savage children and grandchildren had made a treehouse and rope swing in the white pine still standing today. The present-day pond was formerly surrounded by an alder swamp. [5]

Group photographs for weddings at the inn are often taken in the Garden.

Notes

  1. "Asticou Azalea Gardens". Japanese Garden Research Network. Archived from the original on 16 August 2016. Retrieved 16 July 2016.
  2. Asticou Azalea Garden at Mount Desert Land & Garden Preserve Archived August 5, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  3. "History of the Asticou Azalea Garden" Archived October 7, 2011, at the Wayback Machine - Mount Desert Land & Garden Preserve
  4. "History of the Asticou Inn" Archived September 2, 2011, at the Wayback Machine - Asticou Inn website
  5. Interview: Rick Savage, Asticou – Coastal Walk Project, 2017

Related Research Articles

Acadia National Park National park in the US state of Maine

Acadia National Park is an American national park located along the mid-section of the Maine coast, southwest of Bar Harbor. The park preserves about half of Mount Desert Island, part of the Isle au Haut, the tip of the Schoodic Peninsula, and portions of 16 smaller outlying islands. It protects the natural beauty of the rocky headlands, including the highest mountains along the Atlantic coast. Acadia boasts a glaciated coastal and island landscape, an abundance of habitats, a high level of biodiversity, clean air and water, and a rich cultural heritage.

Beatrix Farrand American landscape architect

Beatrix Cadwalader Farrand was an American landscape gardener and landscape architect. Her career included commissions to design about 110 gardens for private residences, estates and country homes, public parks, botanic gardens, college campuses, and the White House. Only a few of her major works survive: Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C., the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden on Mount Desert, Maine, the restored Farm House Garden in Bar Harbor, the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden at the New York Botanical Garden, and elements of the campuses of Princeton, Yale, and Occidental.

Hancock, Maine Town in Maine, United States

Hancock is a town in Hancock County, Maine, United States. The population was 2,466 at the 2020 census. Located on the mainland at the head of Frenchman Bay, Hancock has commanding views of Mount Desert Island.

Sullivan, Maine Town in Maine, United States

Sullivan is a town in Hancock County, Maine, United States. The population was 1,219 at the 2020 census. The town was named for Daniel Sullivan, an early settler. Colloquially referred to as "Sully" or "the Sullivans" – like many Maine municipalities composed of villages with geographic designations of the town proper – the municipality was incorporated in 1789. Located in the Upper Schoodic Peninsula sub-region of Maine's Downeast Acadia region, the municipality has been known as "Waukeag", "New Bristol", and later Sullivan; and once included the nearby communities of Hancock, Sorrento, and what would later be Township 7, South & Middle Districts. Once home to abundant granite quarries, the town of Sullivan is now a residential community for nearby Ellsworth and Mount Desert Island. Located along U.S. Route 1, the Taunton River, and Hog Bay, Sullivan is home to a reversing tidal falls and many scenic turnouts that dot the Schoodic National Scenic Byway along the Upper Schoodic Peninsula.

Tremont, Maine Town in Maine, United States

Tremont is a town in Hancock County, Maine, United States. It is located on the southwestern side of Mount Desert Island, known to locals as "the quiet side."

Bar Harbor, Maine Town in Maine, United States

Bar Harbor is a town on Mount Desert Island in Hancock County, Maine, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population is 5,089. During the summer and fall seasons, it is a popular tourist destination and, until a catastrophic fire in 1947, the town was a noted summer colony for the wealthy.

Mount Desert Island Island in the United States of America

Mount Desert Island in Hancock County, Maine, is the largest island off the coast of Maine. With an area of 108 square miles (280 km2) it is the 52nd-largest island in the United States, the sixth-largest island in the contiguous United States, and the second-largest island on the Eastern Seaboard, behind Long Island and ahead of Martha's Vineyard. According to the 2010 census, the island has a year-round population of 10,615. In 2017, an estimated 3.5 million tourists visited Acadia National Park on MDI. The island is home to numerous well-known summer colonies such as Northeast Harbor and Bar Harbor.

Charles Eliot (landscape architect) American architect (1859–1897)

Charles Eliot was an American landscape architect. Known for pioneering principles of regional planning, naturalistic systems approach to landscape architecture, and laying the groundwork for conservancies across the world. Instrumental in the formation of The Trustees of Reservations, the world's first land trust, playing a central role in shaping the Boston Metropolitan Park System, designing a number of public and private landscapes, and wrote prolifically on a variety of topics.

Portland Japanese Garden

The Portland Japanese Garden is a traditional Japanese garden occupying 12 acres, located within Washington Park in the West Hills of Portland, Oregon, United States. It is operated as a private non-profit organization, which leased the site from the city in the early 1960s. Stephen D. Bloom has been the chief executive officer of the Portland Japanese Garden since 2005.

Max Farrand

Max Farrand was an American historian, who taught at several universities and was the first director of the Huntington Library.

Northeast Harbor, Maine

Northeast Harbor is a village on Mount Desert Island, located in the town of Mount Desert in Hancock County, Maine, United States.

Maine State Route 3

State Route 3 is a 120.67-mile (194.20 km) long state highway located in southern Maine. Its western terminus is at State Route 8, State Route 11 and State Route 27 in Augusta. Its eastern terminus is at State Route 102 and State Route 198 in Mount Desert.

Acadia National Park carriage paths, bridges and gatehouses United States historic place

Acadia National Park, largely on Mount Desert Island, off the coast of the U.S. state of Maine, was created in part by land and other donations by John D. Rockefeller Jr. Between 1919 and 1931, Rockefeller, who was opposed to the introduction of automobiles on the island, personally oversaw the construction of a network of carriage roads, closed to motorized vehicles, on the eastern half of the island, including sixteen granite bridges and two gatehouses. The major portion of this network now falls within the bounds of the national park, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.

Reef Point Estate was located in Bar Harbor, Maine, United States, on Mount Desert Island. Reef Point was the coastal “cottage” of Mary Cadwalder Rawle and Frederic Rhinelander Jones, the parents of landscape architect, Beatrix Farrand (1872–1959).

Maine State Route 102

State Route 102 (SR 102) is a north-south state highway located on Mount Desert Island in eastern Maine. As of 2007, its southern terminus is located at an intersection with SR 102A in Tremont on the southern part of the island. Its northern terminus is at intersection with SR 3 in Bar Harbor, a terminus it shares with SR 198.

Maine State Route 233

State Route 233 is a state highway located on Mount Desert Island on the southern central coast of Maine. Its western terminus is at SR 3 and SR 198 in the town of Mount Desert. It runs for 5.84 miles (9.40 km) across the island to Bar Harbor, where it terminates at SR 3. SR 233 services Acadia National Park and provides a direct connection between Mount Desert and Bar Harbor, bypassing a 15.4-mile (24.8 km) section of SR 3 which loops the perimeter of the eastern lobe of the island. It is locally named Eagle Lake Road.

Asticou Inn Historic inn in Maine, United States

The Asticou Inn is an inn in Northeast Harbor, Maine. It was built in 1883. In 1899, it was destroyed by fire and rebuilt over the course of two years.

Thuya Garden

Thuya Garden is a semi-formal herbaceous garden, in the style of Gertrude Jekyll, located at 15 Thuya Drive, Northeast Harbor, Maine. It is open daily from May through October.

Frederick Lincoln Savage American architect (1861 - 1924)

Frederick Lincoln Savage was an American architect, known as Mount Desert Island's most prolific native architect. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, he designed over 300 cottages on the island and across Northeastern Maine, including Reverie Cove and the John Innes Kane Cottage in Bar Harbor, and Raventhorp in Southwest Harbor, all listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). He also designed the NRHP-listed West Gouldsboro Village Library in Gouldsboro, Maine.

Little Long Pond (Seal Harbor, Maine) Large pond in Maine, United States

Little Long Pond is a pond in Seal Harbor, Maine, United States, at the southern end of Mount Desert Island. Fed by Jordan Stream, a runoff of Jordan Pond, the pond is separated from Bracy Cove at the Gulf of Maine by a narrow causeway carrying State Route 3. It is officially called Long Pond, but has been given the Little prefix to differentiate it from other Long Ponds in the area. A 2.2 miles (3.5 km) trail circumnavigates the pond, while an offshoot leads to Jordan Pond House. Mostly flat on its eastern side, it rises somewhat from the pond's northern end to around halfway down its western side.

References

  1. Mount Desert Land & Garden Preserve. "Asticou Azalea Garden"

Coordinates: 44°18′18″N68°17′02″W / 44.305°N 68.284°W / 44.305; -68.284