Mike and Sue Krivit were photographers living in White Bear Lake and commuting daily to their studio in Minneapolis. This was not how they wanted to live.
“Spending over an hour in the car each way? Forget it,” says Sue. “It seemed really appealing to us to live and work in the same place.”
In 1990, the couple bought a midcentury rambler in St. Paul’s St. Anthony Park neighborhood that was zoned for both commercial and residential use. It had been converted to office space, but the couple returned it to its original dual use: home and business. The yard, mostly parking lot and weeds, was not the point.
“The property was most attractive because it had the correct zoning and enough space to do a large studio addition,” Sue says. “Gardening came afterward, as we excavated to put in the photography studio and garage addition.”
“Once you end up with dirt, you have to do something with it, and then there was no turning back,” Mike says.
“It became a passion once we got started,” Sue says. “Both of us have art backgrounds and consider the garden a work of art and a creative expression.”
TOUGH TERRAIN
Now, the garden is also a backdrop for Krivit Photography, used for food, garden and outdoor living photo shoots, as well as a place to entertain clients.
“It’s our outdoor studio,” Sue says.
Years ago, though, when the Krivits first contemplated the yard’s makeover, it was overwhelming. The rambler is situated on the equivalent of four city lots.
“Our neighbor said that we don’t have a garden — we have a park,” Sue says.
Initially, it was less park and more Frances Hodgson Burnett’s “Secret Garden,” since the property had sat empty for about three years. The grounds were overgrown, neglected. To add to the overwhelmed-ness of it all, it wasn’t a matter of just pulling weeds and planting flowers.
“We’re at the bottom of the block, with seven neighbors above us,” Mike says. “Walls had to go up to hold the slope from falling apart, things had to be planted just to hold the earth in or we’d get mudslides when it rained.”
“Terracing was the solution to create a multilevel garden,” says Sue. “Erosion was also an issue with the steep slopes. To control runoff, we carved out paver-lined spillways inspired by the Boboli Garden in Italy.”
Water is an important element, too. The couple built a series of small ponds and waterfalls cascading from the top of the multilevel garden to the bottom patio.
“Every spring, when we turn the waterfall on, it’s always a shock — it’s like magic that we’ve created,” Mike says. “It makes that wonderful noise and the sunshine hits it and it sparkles … you know it’s not nature, but it is as real as it can get, especially now that the plants are fully grown, the hostas and ferns hanging into the edge of the water.”
Walking paths wind through the garden, leading to sitting areas throughout.
“There’s an upper patio and a lower patio and the patio at ‘the headwaters’ — the top of the waterfall — it’s kind of a secret garden, because you can’t really see it for most of the year,” Sue says. “To get to it, you walk up a short set of stairs and take a path that curves and then you come to this spot with a fire pit and some vintage, green-and-white metal chairs.”
UNFRIENDLY SOIL
The garden’s design and installation has taken place one project at a time, and the couple did it themselves, except for the retaining walls and patios. They learned as they went.
“We had not done that much gardening previously,” Sue says. “Just small projects here and there, putting in shrubs and maintaining lawns and putting in flower gardens, but nothing on this scope. We started with trying to grow grass in shade.”
It was a tough landscape for novices.
“We had a slope, soil clay and a lot of shade,” Sue says. “So, we had a challenging environment to grow things in.”
After some trial-and-error, the gardeners opted for standard choices in their woodland garden.
“Generally, in Minnesota, there’s not a huge range of shade plants,” Sue says. “We just made use of what grows well.”
That includes hostas, ferns, lilies of the valley and impatiens.
“The weird specialty plants don’t always work,” she says. “I’ve stayed with tried-and-true plants that I know will grow.”
Tried-and-true is beautiful, too.
“We have a big section of violets; they grow as a groundcover under the tree canopy,” Sue says. “They’re really pretty when they bloom.”
The gardeners have had to compromise with the water features, too.
“We haven’t done fish, because raccoons kept eating the koi and the large goldfish,” Sue says. “We don’t have water lilies, because there’s not enough sunshine. We do have marsh marigolds, though, a bright yellow flower that grows within the rocks that line the bottom of the pond.”
SURPRISING ORNAMENTS
The front yard has its charms, too.
“People passing by stop to look at the lawn, which Mike sculpts into concentric circles,” Sue says. “The shovel tree is another car stopper. Broken shovels have been hung from an oak tree. At first, these were our castoffs, but over time, many have been donated by family and friends and an occasional one is left by an anonymous donor. They sway in the breeze and chime and clang in a stiff wind.”
Since the couple works from home, they have the opportunity to listen to the shovel chimes and to smell the flowers, especially since they added a porch off the kitchen.
“We eat lunch out in the garden or take the coffee and the paper out there in the morning,” Mike says. “We’re wireless, so you can take your laptop and phone and work outside, too. It’s nice.”
“We do sit more now than in the beginning,” Sue says. “Originally, we would work until the sun set. Now, we’re able to stop a little before that and enjoy it. We’re not developing gardens anymore, we’re maintaining them.”
Pulling weeds and watering flowers at the start or end of a workday sure beats commuting.
“Our best days are those spent tending the gardens,” Sue says. “The smell of the earth and the warm sun are our tonic.” T
Molly Guthrey is a reporter for the Pioneer Press and a frequent contributor to Spaces.
