When you first walk into Peter Van Norde's garden in Duluth, you know you're looking at the work of a master. Yet in talking to him, you become even more amazed by how this all came to be.

Peter was born in Newark, NJ, in 1921, to parents who immigrated from the Netherlands and Austria-Hungary. He wanted to see more of the country, so he attended Georgia Tech, where he studied aeronautical engineering. He served on an aircraft carrier during WWII. He later worked for Dr. Goddard at Curtiss Wright in NJ, developing rocket motors for the Bell X2 aircraft. He also continued to serve in the Naval Reserve, eventually retiring as a Captain. Meanwhile, he also attended law school at night, and then practiced law for 45 years. He retired in 1997, and moved to his current Duluth home in 1999.

Peter was never a gardener before he came to Georgia. His only experience with plants was occasionally picking some parsley for his mother's cooking. But he loved the beauty of gardens, and whenever he saw one he liked, he kept that image in his mind. He has traveled a lot in his life, for work, as a private pilot until 1998, and as a skier and golfer. As he gave up those hobbies, for health reasons, he felt that he needed a new hobby to take up his time, his energy, and, he says, his money. When he saw the property he would purchase in 1999, he could visualize a garden with water features, and couldn't wait to get to it. He laid out the design, and hired someone to help make it happen. And what happened is fabulous!

Peter with a visitor and a lurking gnome in the garden

A flat suburban wedge-shaped lot sloped steeply upward behind the house, topped by a pine plantation. The slope, with 60 tons of rock added, now includes a cascading waterfall and pond, meandering paths, secluded seating areas, and a 60-foot arbor at the top of the hill. This hardscape anchors intensive plantings of roses, shrubs, perennials, and small trees. A private well helps to keep it all watered. The garden has continued to expand, and now covers most of the back yard, the sides, and now the narrow front yard of the house. From the living room window, from the back patio, and from all the other seating areas, there are views of the garden, and the sound of birds and water. Wow!

Peter says that he selects plants pretty much at random, buying whatever he likes, and then figures out where to put them. A visitor's first impression is of shrub and old garden roses, but there are hybrid teas, too. The Cherokee Rose and Mermaid have their own trees to climb; other climbers are arranged on swags around the house, cover the arbor (New Dawn), and the fence behind the arbor. He says that when he got to 100 roses, he thought, "that's enough." He says he must not have been very convincing; since now he has 250.

Peter says that he can only work in the garden for a couple of hours at a time, before he needs to sit down and rest and enjoy what he sees and smells. He hires helpers, and directs their work in the garden, while he sits and watches and enjoys.

For Peter, the whole point of having the garden is to share it with others. When I first met him the garden was only a year old and already fabulous, and he wanted to invite the rose society to come visit. Since then, the garden has grown, and is often visited as well by garden clubs, senior citizen groups, garden tours, and anyone else who loves beauty and roses. If you haven't been there, you should go!

I've always said growing roses isn't rocket science, but the way Peter does it, maybe it is!