Landscape Architecture magazine features tribute to the Water Garden
Posted: 03-01-2006 :

Raleigh, NC -- Months before its deconstruction is slated to begin, the Water Garden, award-winning landscape architect Dick Bell's 11-acre home and office complex along Raleigh's Glenwood Avenue for the past 50 years, has finally received its due from the "bible" of the profession, Landscape Architecture magazine. The February edition includes a six-page tribute to Water Garden in its "Changing Places" section entitled, "Requiem For A Garden."

Water Garden captured the magazine's attention when editor J. William Thompson, FASLA, learned that it was to be sold to a developer who will introduce a senior housing complex into the site's rolling terrain, ancient trees, and wildlife-filled ponds and streams. While the developer reportedly plans to save as many trees and water features as possible, "In the end, what's left will indeed be a faint echo of the Water Garden," writes the article's author, North Carolina native, N.C. State University graduate, and fellow landscape architect Glenn Morris.

The article includes color photographs of the property's large, signature pond with fall color mirrored in the water, along with shots of the lush, natural environment Bell, a fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects, learned from and cultivated for half a century.

"The Water Garden began as a forward-looking site plan," Morris writes, "but it also became a collage of garden vignettes. Bell...used Water Garden as an outdoor laboratory." He notes various plant materials that Bell single-handedly introduced to the local landscape via his experimentation at Water Garden, including Indian and Yeddo hawthorn.

"He was one of the first to use two native plants, southern wax myrtle and river birch, in a garden setting," he adds, "...[and] he mixed native plants with ornamental exotics such as the Japanese maples."

The article also points out that the award-winning Modern buildings on the property will be destroyed when the new developer rolls in. "The sculptural parking bays nestled between trees will [also] go... The planted berms that gave a gardenesque flavor to the parking will be flattened... The flowing exposed aggregate walkways are slated to be hauled off."

Bell does intend to remove many of his prized Japanese maples before deconstruction begins, Morris notes.

Dick Bell's final words in the article are, "This place has fulfilled all of its missions."

Landscape Architecture, the official magazine of the ASLA, is available at most newsstands.