Natives at Stoneleigh with Ethan Kauffman - A Way to Garden With Margaret Roach - July 10, 2023

Can a historic formal space become the home to a forward-thinking landscape of native plants? The team at Stoneleigh, a five-year-old public garden on an old estate in Villanova, Pennsylvania, says the answer is an emphatic yes, and their horticultural experiments seem to prove that’s true. 

Its director, Ethan Kauffman, is here today to talk about how he and his team are reinterpreting the grand old landscape with a natives-only ethos handed down to them by the non-profit called Natural Lands that conserved the place.    

Two-dozen kinds of native vines now climb the majestic century-old stone pergola at Stoneleigh, and space-defining hedges of white pine and American arborvitae, or dwarf Magnolia grandiflora and among those redefining the 42-acre landscape. There are lots of other lessons for home gardeners, too.