i 
MAKING A SMALL GARDEN LOOK LARGE 
ARTHUR G. ELDREDGE 
University of Illinois 
Where Many Types of Wild Beauty Find Themselves at Home on a ioo x 300 ft. Lot 
Only Five Minutes by Trolley from the Business Center of an Illinois City 
A VIEW OF ROCK RIVER FROM THE PORCH 
The brow and side of the twenty foot bank is clothed with 
shrubs and vines while below a canoe waits in the Willows by 
the river path. Who would guess this placid, sylvan scene to 
be only five minutes by trolley from the business center of a 
city! Rugosa Roses frame the porch and Irises lift light 
bloom beside the stepping-stones (left); the relation of this bit 
of planting to the whole is shown in the accompanying plan 
EDITORIAL FOREWORD 
M Y FIRST attempt at gardening,” writes Mr. Howell (owner and 
part creator of the delightful small garden with a large aspect 
here described in picture and text), “was to transform a little back 
yard on the place where I was then living. My enjoyment of the gar¬ 
den increased till thirteen years ago I bought the present lot. The 
day after the deed was closed I sent for Mr. Simonds. I had not met 
him up to that time but had heard of his work. We agreed on a plan. 
1 was not to build the house for several years but set about at once to 
raise the plants needed to carry out the plan, from cuttings, nursery¬ 
man’s transplants, and material collected from the wild. While the 
plants were growing, we were planning the house and when we built, 
seven years ago, the planting on the entire lot except where the house 
was to stand was in place and the plants which were to go near the 
house at its completion were growing in the vegetable garden ready for 
transplanting. It is an enjoyable experience. Having done practically 
all the work with my own hands, I know the habits and culture of the 
plants as a mother knows her children. It is a healthful pastime. 
During many years of indoor business life garden work has kept me with¬ 
out trace of troubles many suffer from through lack of proper exercise. 
“ I wish your magazine could impress upon the minds of clients the 
necessity of understanding the purpose and spirit of working in full 
sympathy with the designer’s plans. It would save many disappoint¬ 
ments on both sides.” 
We have quoted rather fully from Mr. Howell’s letter because it 
stresses several often overlooked points of value to home owners and 
garden makers in general, and because the success of his plan and 
method of working furnish indisputable proof of its soundness. 
The “garden first” idea is at all times a logical one for two essentia! 
reasons. First, because every house is inevitably linked with its setting 
and, no matter how great its inherent beauty, maybe—andalas! too often 
unfortunately is—marred by an unharmonious environment. Second, 
because though shingles and mortar and iron may be successfully welded 
into a finished unit within a .few months time, growing things measure 
their mellowness by years, spurning indecent haste and taking on love¬ 
liness with deliberation season by season. 
Just now while building costs still soar, Mr. Howell’s achievement 
comes with special force and stimulation for many a man who is 
holding a bit of land impatiently awaiting a drop in prices. Instead 
of being merely an aggravating reminder of his impotence in the 
face of present conditions, this bit of land is fraught with all the 
inspiration of a beginning actually at hand, the best sort of a beginning 
leading to the happiest of results—the leisurely, personal up-building 
of a permanent and beautiful home. 
PLAN OF THE PROPERTY 
The result of close and sympathetic cooperation between 
the owner, Mr. E. N. Howell, and the landscape archi¬ 
tect, Mr. O. C. Simonds, by which the grounds (ioo x 
300 ft.) were completely laid out and planted over a 
period of several years preceding the building of the house. 
(See illustrations opposite, also on pages 334 and 335) 
332 
