This man’s Portage la Prairie garden is his castle

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This article was published 30/06/2023 (1173 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Earlier this year, Willy Klassen was awarded the Burgess Shield for the 2022 Best Urban Home Grounds.

Klassen’s garden was Portage la Prairie’s nomination for the Manitoba Good Roads Association’s annual competition for populations over 7,500.

It will be one of the many gardens featured in the innaguaral Holiday Avenue Project Garden Tour on July 22.

Last week on the first day of summer, I had a chance to tour Klassen’s extraordinary garden. Situated on a quiet, tree-lined street in the city of Portage, Klassen’s house was once a farmhouse that belonged to the Hill family who owned Hill’s Drug Store, which was started in 1901. T

he front of the 80-foot by 135-foot lot is still framed by a hedge which can be seen in an old photograph of the house. On the front boulevard stands a massive Silver Maple tree, easily 60 to 80 feet tall, its root-flare-like firmly planted feet and expansive girth (nine feet or 2.7 metres) denoting its advanced age.

Four handsome trees line Klassen’s boulevard, and around each one he has carved out broad, circular gardens and planted them with dozens of irises.

This was my first glimpse of Klassen’s keen attention to detail. I was intrigued from the moment I stepped onto the wooden boardwalk, which is built around a sunken front yard garden planted with a skillful mix of foliage plants and flowers and accented with driftwood and antique items.

Diverse, lush, imaginative, pristine, and unconventional — Klassen’s garden is all these things.

Anticipation is the best part of seeing a private garden for the first time and there is always an eagerness to delve into garden beds to see what’s been planted and sometimes to discover new methods or solutions.

But Klassen goes beyond that. He has conceptualized a space that is designed to create a memorable experience.

In his backyard, a long boardwalk path lined with fabulous foliage beckons the visitor to discover hidden garden rooms. At certain junctures, you step off the boardwalk onto impossibly lush islands of grass with inlaid stepping stones.

Klassen is a master edger. You won’t find a single weed. He’s not into woodchip mulch and likes his soil black, although he digs grass clippings into his beds, all of which are curved and planted with layers of shrubs and perennials framed by high-limbed trees and dogwood shrubs.

Perennials such as Bergenia, Siberian irises, daylilies, and lilies dominate, but he also grows bee balm, coneflowers, rudbeckias, and perennial geraniums.

In one area, beautiful, big hostas are juxtaposed with an ornamental rhubarb with its enormous serrated lobed leaves. Tucked in are upright Maltese Cross with brilliant orange flowers preparing to bloom beside the airy, fern-like foliage of yarrow, a poppy with taupe-coloured seed pods and the grass-like foliage of large clumps of orange-flowered daylilies.

Ladyslipper orchids with pink and yellow flowers are paired with Hosta Praying Hands.

Everywhere there is a vibrant mix of varying textures, sizes, and shapes.

Klassen’s different garden rooms hold several surprises, not least of which is a giant otherworldly perennial that commands attention in the centre of a curved border.

He knew he wanted the plant the first moment he saw it on a visit to a friend’s garden and took home a small piece of it, but the species name was unknown to both Klassen and the original owner.

Hardy and vigorous with enormous coarse leaves on tall stems and a distinctly tropical-looking appearance — frankly, I had no clue as to what it might be. Perennial horseradish, perhaps, but without the characteristically undulating leaves?

Then Klassen mentioned that the plant produces bright yellow daisy-like flowers with shaggy petals in mid-summer. The name search was on. I reached out to Lyndon Penner, head gardener at Riding Mountain National Park.

“This is most definitely Inula helenium,” he said. Common names include elecampane, horse heal, else dock, and wild sunflower. “We have some in the gardens here at RMNP and they are a big hit with the butterflies. They also make nice cut flower material.”

There are approximately 80 species of Inula, said Penner. “All are robust, burly plants and quite showy and unusual in the summer border. Inula helenium has a long history of medicinal use as well. They self-sow but without being weedy and the migrating songbirds like to eat their seeds.”

If you are looking for inspiration on which type of tree to plant in your garden, Klassen’s garden features many enviable, striking specimens that will open your eyes to a range of possibilities.

“I love my trees,” he said. That’s plain to see. Compact understory trees that are high-limbed, meticulously trained and brimming with good health decorate his landscape throughout.

Ohio Buckeye (Aesculus glabra) is a clear favourite, its sweeping branches of fan-shaped palmate leaves softly framing the entrance to each garden room. There are singular specimens, too, such as Oakleaf Mountain Ash (Sorbus hybrida), with unique, lobed green foliage with silver undersides.

With multi-season interest, it produces white flowers in spring and dark red berries in fall as do so many of the tree varieties in his landscape.

Near the end of the boardwalk path is perhaps the biggest surprise as it transitions into a bridge over a creek dug out entirely by hand.

Creating the creek took an entire summer, said Klassen. It extends about 55 feet or 16 metres to a log cabin which he also built by hand.

There is water in the creek only in the spring when the snow melts or when there is rainfall and then the base of the creek might fill with a few inches of water before it percolates into the soil. This area is the shadiest part of the garden.

“I wanted to make my yard look like the Whiteshell,” he said. “Everyone who visits likes to step deep into the dappled shade areas to snap photos of the bridge.”

Carefully arranged boulders and driftwood give an authentic feel to the garden and vintage items such as a tall green antique water pump are reminiscent of another time.

Everywhere there is bird song. Klassen has built several birdhouses for the many wrens and goldfinches who live here.

The log cabin is revealing. Klassen is a hunter and as devoted as he is to his garden, come autumn he likes to escape. “After I’ve done this all summer, I like to forget about it for a while and go out to the Carberry Sandhills and hunt.”

Klassen, 63, moved to Portage from Winnipeg, where he worked at Winter’s Collision Repair for 30 years. He purchased his current property nine years ago and his garden has been eight years in the making.

The July 22 garden tour is a fundraiser for the Holiday Avenue Project Garden. The tour consists mainly of urban gardens and one rural garden, including a previous winner of the Manitoba Good Roads Association’s annual competition.

The tour is from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased at Portage la Prairie Community Revitalization Corporation, 56 Royal Road North.

colleenizacharias@gmail.com