Photos
Here are some of downtown Olympia’s best secret gardens.
1. YASHIRO JAPANESE GARDEN
1010 Plum St. SE
For a garden that’s been there two decades, Olympia’s Japanese Garden gets surprisingly little attention. In less than an acre, there’s all the Japanese maples, pines, paths and stone lanterns you could want, and often some cool temporary public art as well in this tranquil oasis.
2. NEIGHBORHOOD SITTING CORNER
Northwest corner of Ninth and Adams Streets
Under bamboo arches are two little chairs and a chess-tile table, surrounded by bee-humming lavender and snowberries. Hard to believe you’re on a street corner, literally, but this little neighborhood nook behind the Timberline Library is a nice place to chill with a friend and watch the traffic.
3. HARMONY MARKET BUILDING
113 Thurston Ave. – front courtyard
Four fall-tinged maples, underplanted with ferns and azaleas, nod elegantly to four twisted junipers across a cement courtyard. A bench would be wonderful in this surprisingly formal street garden.
4. CENTENNIAL PARK
Southwest corner of Union and Franklin Streets
Tucked away on an ivy-covered bank up crumbling, moss-covered steps is a park straight out of “Lord of the Rings.” A bench blends into the cool rhododendrons, maples tower overhead, squirrels dash around and on the topmost point is an enormous Western red cedar with a wide, rough trunk, standing sentinel like one of Tolkien’s Ents.
5. THE MARK RESTAURANT BOUNDARIES
409 Columbia St. – front of building and down the alleyway
It’s not a sit-down garden, but in a city full of sidewalk-fronted buildings, it’s a welcome patch of green. Walk along the alley beside The Mark restaurant and run your hands along the lavender, sage and rosemary bushes. You’ll be inhaling Provence all day long.
6. NORTHWEST ECOBUILDING
Southwest corner of Ninth and Adams Streets – parking strip play area and chicken coop
It’s so Olympia: a city corner mulched to the gills, decorated with a children’s play tractor and home to a flock of chickens. Northwest EcoBuilding, on the same block as the gorgeously edible gardens of Fertile Ground B&B, has sheet-mulched its entire property, including the parking strip, to plant veggies. The best bit? A chicken-food vending machine, 25 cents to feed what have to be the happiest chickens in downtown Oly.
Rosemary Ponnekanti: 253-597-8568 rosemary.ponnekanti@thenewstribune.com
