I was reading Debbie and Rod's blog, Keeping Up With The Kendall's, the other day and noticed that, last Wednesday, joined by a few friends, they had visited Butchart Garden's in Victoria, B.C. They also posted some great pictures of the flowers and gardens. I've lived in Victoria since the age of 13 and, I'm sad to say, have only visited this world famous attraction once in my entire life - in August, 2001. It was also Paulette's first visit to Butchart Garden's as well. I wonder what's up with that?
Butchart's famous "Sunken Gardens" - formerly a limestone quarry
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| From butchart gardens |
I remembered taking some pictures with my old Kodak DC-4800 3MP camera, so I thought I'd look at the digital pic library on my computer to see if they were still there. Sure enough, I found them. So, since Friday was a pretty quiet day at home, with nothing much at all happening, I thought I'd just post a few of the pics I took that day and talk a bit about the history of the Butchart family and the wonderful gardens that they created.
Everywhere one looks, it's just a blizzard of colorful flowers and plants
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| From butchart gardens |
Robert Pim Butchart, a former dry goods merchant, began manufacturing Portland cement in 1888, near his birthplace of Owen Sound, Ontario. By the turn of the century he had become a highly successful pioneer in this burgeoning North American industry. He was attracted to the West Coast of Canada by rich limestone deposits, vital for cement production, and built a factory at Tod Inlet, on Vancouver Island - just north of Victoria, B.C. He, and his family, built a home their in 1904.
As Robert Butchart's cement business exhausted the limestone in the quarry near their house, his resourceful wife, Jennie, conceived a plan for refurbishing the bleak pit. From nearby farmlands, she requisitioned tons of top soil, had it brought to Tod Inlet by horse and cart, and used it to line the floor of the abandoned quarry. Little by little, under Jennie Butchart's supervision, the abandoned quarry blossomed into the spectacular Sunken Garden.
I know what roses look like, but after that flowers are all the same to me!
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| From butchart gardens |
By 1908, reflecting their world travels, the Butcharts had created a Japanese Garden on the sea-side of their home. Later an Italian Garden was created on the site of their former tennis court, and a fine Rose Garden replaced a large kitchen vegetable patch in 1929.
The renown of Mrs. Butchart's gardening quickly spread. By the 1920's more than fifty thousand people came each year to see her creation. In a gesture toward all their visitors, the hospitable Butchart's christened their estate Benvenuto - the Italian word for Welcome. To extend the welcome, the Butchart's purchased flowering cherry trees, from Yokohama Nursery in Japan, and planted them along Benvenuto Avenue from West Saanich Road to The Butchart Gardens entrance.
Close to 1,000,000 people visit Butchart Gardens every year.
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| From butchart gardens |
The Butchart's home grew into a comfortable, luxurious showplace, with a bowling alley, indoor salt-water swimming pool, paneled billiard room and a wonder of its age, a self-playing Aeolian pipe organ(still played on Firework Saturdays). Today the residence contains the Dining Room Restaurant, offices, and rooms still used for family entertaining. From January 15 to March 15, a special re-creation of the family house is showcased.
Each year over 1,000,000 bedding plants in some 700 varieties are used throughout the Gardens to ensure uninterrupted bloom from March through October. Close to a million people visit each year, enjoying not only the floral beauty, but the entertainment and lighting displays presented each summer and Christmas.
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| From butchart gardens |
The only surviving portion of Mr. Butchart's Tod Inlet cement factory is the tall chimney of a long vanished kiln. The chimney can be seen from The Sunken Garden Lookout. The plant stopped manufacturing cement in 1916, but continued to make tiles and flower pots as late as 1950. The single chimney now overlooks the quarry Mrs. Butchart so miraculously reclaimed.
The Butchart Gardens remains a family business and has grown to become a premier West Coast display garden, while maintaining the gracious traditions of the past. Today the Gardens has established an international reputation for its year round display of flowering plants.
It's still hard to realize that we have only visited this amazing place only once even though it's so close to us. We'll just have to put it on our list of 'things we must do' and make it a priority!
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