DAYtrip
John C. and Margaret K. White Gardens Horticultural Park
By Charlotte Benedetto The John C. and Margaret K. White Gardens Horticultural Park is a new and remarkable public park in the heart of suburban Fairfax County, VA, and is an unmissable stop for any native plant fanatic or meadow enthusiast. A genuinely absorbing woodland and meadow native planting site, the White Gardens sits at 3301 Hawthorne Lane in Falls Church, VA, and has the potential to become a truly great native plant garden. The White Gardens Park has a certain feature of terrain and a particular vision that provides a sense that it is not only a facility with so much happening already, but so much to potentially offer. Under the direction of site manager Judy Zatsick, I would not be surprised to see it become a significant and important native plant gardening center in the DC area similar to the Mt. Cuba Center in Hockessin, DE. On terrain already gifted with a versatile acid soil, the White Gardens Park is a former private residence that has been converted into a public park. Sitting snugly at the end of a cul-de-sac in a quiet family neighborhood, its aspect 6
WASHINGTON GARDENER
OCTOBER 2021
is one of quiet mystery and a unique personality. But this is not a remote homestead or a rural site—the neighbors are never more than a stone’s throw away, whether they are humans or deer. The park’s paths have a complex soil narrative, with shifting components, moisture levels, and elevations; there is so much potential here to install different kinds of native species, and to interact with the site’s ever-changing and ever-unfolding narratives of sun and moisture levels. Despite the vagaries of pokeweed, wild lettuce, and porcelainberry, this garden (and its inner meadow) is a prime site for the development and study of the native plants of Northern Virginia. Changes in elevation and sun exposure tease and ribbon throughout the White Gardens, potentially offering something for just about every kind of native plant in one site. The supreme feature is the meadow: its grassy-sweetness everywhere, and its clouds of seed releasing in billows when the wind blows like confetti. Eversquabbling jays, clouds of mayflies like
tumbling glitter—the meadow pulses out a sensual appeal, pulling and drawing visitors hither and thither, drawing the eye to each surface, species, and texture change. It’s easy to become lost in the White Gardens’ many transitions and colors. It is not, however, easy to become physically lost in this tidy and compact suburban park. A chorus of children and leaf blowers often drone along with the crickets and songbirds. Curvaceous with hills, microclimates, and unfolding slopes and flat areas, a small hardwood stand, or miniature upland graces a sort of paddock or open yard near the White Gardens residence. An understated vintage brick cottage—the former White residence— radiates the unique local glamour of mature buildings in this area, somehow having avoided the destruction of the developer’s wrecking ball. The Whites lived in this brick cottage at the top of a curved and sloping crunchy-gravel driveway; small shrubs and a gentle shadow of rhododendron jungles behind the house form an attractive, wet-looking green mass.
