BELFAST — Above the Footbridge across Belfast Harbor, heading toward East Belfast, a cantilevered, shingled house perches on the hill. Winter unpeels the leafy camouflage, but in summer, the house nearly disappears behind a thick scrim of trees. On Saturday, July 6 from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m., visitors will have a chance to see behind the trees and into the extensive hilltop gardens when Angela Hill opens her home and garden, located at 11 Footbridge Road, as part of the Belfast Garden Club’s Open Garden Days.
The $5 admission to the house and garden helps to support the club’s public service projects throughout the year. The event will be held rain or shine. Season passes will be available for $35 on site.
Hill, formerly a news anchor with the CBS affiliate in New Orleans, bought the house 20 years ago with her husband Irwin Marcus, a psychiatrist. Although they’d lived in the southern United States for years, Hill was born in Portland and moving back to New England for retirement became a priority. “We found this house on the internet, and as soon as we walked through it, I knew it was meant to be,” Hill said. “But it was the gardens that called my name.”
The previous owner was a master gardener. “Every plant was labeled in Latin,” Hill remarks. But the new owners were initially still working full-time in New Orleans, and for a seasonal home, a high-maintenance garden didn’t make sense. Hill, now a full-time Belfastian, explains that “with the incredible guidance and creativity of Wentworth Hill Landscaping, over the last 15 years we have made the gardens our own, and they continue to evolve.”
The property, which encompasses two acres, contains a mix of sun and shade gardens that range from formal beds enclosed by hedges to more colorful, casual plantings of flowering perennials in the sunnier beds. Hostas, which Hill finds “simple, but elegant,” have pride of place in some shady nooks. Old flowering trees such as redbud, Japanese lilac, and dogwood line the paths, which visitors will be welcome to stroll.
“Many of our plants have been chosen to encourage pollinators,” Hill says. “I hope when visitors come they will see the LIFE in the garden, watching bees and butterflies flutter among the flowers.”
Open Garden Days will be held each Saturday through Aug. 17. For the complete Open Garden Days schedule, visit belfastgardenclub.org. Proceeds support the garden club’s school programs, camp scholarships, library donations, and public gardens in Belfast that are maintained by club volunteers.
