The Druid Hills Tour of Homes & Gardens is this weekend – April 28-30. Tour hours are today until 5 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Get tickets and more details here.
Spring is in the air and the Druid Hills Tour of Homes & Gardens is right around the corner! This year we are partnering with virtually every environmentally oriented non-profit in Druid Hills (we are calling ourselves the “Canopy Coalition”) to put on a fantastic “Spring Celebration”.
The Olmsted Linear Park Alliance, South Fork Conservancy, Fernbank Forest, Trees Atlanta, The Georgia Native Plant Society, and The Georgia Audubon Society are all taking part and will be hosting various events throughout the neighborhood to highlight the gorgeous natural gardens and greenspaces here in Druid Hills.
In keeping with the “Spring Celebration” we are having a decidedly Garden themed Tour this year. We are featuring homes like 1755 Ridgewood, a beautiful craftsman cottage with clinker brick and Tudor accents, set in a bucolic one-acre wooded garden with a creek running through it, directly adjacent to Vickers Park and Peavine Creek. We also have a rare true native plant garden down the street at 1721 Dyson Dr.
Before you go to the next house on the Tour, take some time to stroll through Fernbank Forest. The Fernbank Museum has agreed to open up Fernbank Forest, one of the last remaining stands of old growth forests in Atlanta, with 300-year old specimen hardwoods, to the Tour going public. You will also be able to access the award-winning rooftop garden at Springdale Park Elementary (803 Briarcliff Rd).
We have a trio of cozy homes in my neck of the woods along Harvard Rd. A quaint Tudor at 1360 Harvard perched high on a hill overlooking the neighborhood, with a warm and inviting patio and pergola in the back which makes you feel aloft in the canopy of the hardwoods overhead. A recently renovated brick craftsman with covered front porch and rare jerkinhead dormer is just a few houses down the street at 1378 Harvard, and a gorgeous clinker brick Tudor with turret and crenelated porte-cochere which I and my neighbors affectionately refer to as the “Castle House.”
Down the street at 1491 Emory Rd., we have a rare private five acre wooded garden with a creek running through it, walking trails, and a magnificent koi pond and waterfall. Just a short walk away, you will find the Peavine Trail where you can take a guided tour with members of the South Fork Conservancy and the Friends of Peavine Trail. Bring your kids on Saturday and enjoy an opportunity to learn about hummingbirds and plant native flowers in the South Fork Conservancy’s Rain Garden, where they will be hosting music and plantings of natives and pollinator friendly plants. At 883 Oakdale, we have a magnificent Walter T. Downing estate home on a grand nearly two-acre estate lot, with a spectacular garden in the back, that is not to be missed.
It’s going to be a great Tour. We hope you will join us!
