The Butchart Gardens
The Butchart Gardens
Jennie Butchart moved to Victoria BC with her husband Robert. Robert worked in cement and Vancouver Island had large limestone deposits to quarry.
In Victoria, a Japanese garden designer by the name of Isaburo Kishida was commissioned to design a Japanese Tea House in 1907. Jennie Butchart became a fan of the designs prompting her to commission the 65-year-old Yokohama native to design Japanese gardens for her estate. Kishida wouldn’t return to Japan until 1912.
The garden’s most well-known feature is its sunken garden. The limestone quarry that Robert Butchart mined was located on the estate and had been exhausted by 1909 (don’t feel bad they were still super rich) so they began developing the sunken garden out of the crater that was left. It was completed in 1921. In 1929 they hired the landscape architect Butler Sturtevant to design the rose garden.
The gardens have been open to visitors since 1904.
Other Things About the Gardens
Apparently, Robert Butchart collected birds and the story goes that while traveling in Europe he got word a couple of his ducks had been killed so he insisted that he and his wife travel to Germany to purchase some replacement ducks (I know…I didn’t know German ducks were so special) which made them miss their cruise back across the Atlantic on the Titanic.
The Butchart’s gifted the gardens to their 21-year-old grandson in 1939.
Jennie Butchart was a certified chemist and actually worked at the cement firm’s lab.
The gardens were designated a Historic Site of Canada in 2004.
Prices vary with the season. One adult admission sets you back around $40 US.
Image: Sunken Garden at Butchart Gardens in Victoria, British Columbia, circa 1920. Public Domain
Sources: www.butchartgardens.com/ Retrieved 2021-1-23
Butchart Gardens. Canadian Register of Historic Places. Retrieved 2021-1-22
Wolf, Jim (February 2003). “Isaburu Kishida: British Columbia’s pioneer Japanese landscape designer” (PDF). Retrieved 2021-8-10