Garden enthusiasts got a chance to peruse six unique and elaborate hidden gardens as part of this year’s Secret Garden Walk sponsored by the Miller Garden Club.
The 18th annual event gave visitors the opportunity to peruse six private gardens located in the Miller Beach area. This year’s theme was “Petal Pushers,” a play on words referring the short pants popular in the 1950s and ’60s
“I’m an avid green thumber and always looking for new ideas,” said Donna Sentmeyer of Merrillville, as she waited for her friends to arrive at the Marquette Park Aquatorium, where the event originated. “I come to this event every year and always leave with ideas of something I want to try.”
The garden walk featured six different sites among the dunes. The elaborate greenery plots included native plants, perennials, annuals, and others, with various unique decorations added to the mix.
The first garden on the tour was the newly-created kayak launch on the Marquette Park lagoon, located 50 yards from the Aquatorium.
This site was accessible to everyone, including those with need for handicapped accessibility. The gardens and launch were designed and created by Miller resident Zully Alvarado, using universal design elements and includes a special path and flowers that are easily cared for by people who are in wheelchairs.
Other gardens on the walk featured “straw bale” gardening, low-maintenance gardening and lakeview gardens, among others.
The unique straw bale garden was designed using decomposed bales instead of soil for the vegetables and flowers.
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While checking out the greenery sprouting out of the bales, Joyce Leavitt of Ogden Dunes commented that since she was having quite a few shrubs removed from her yard, so she was in the market to look for something to replace them.
“I need to make plans to fill in that area,” she said, as she admired the 9-foot-tall sunflowers that overshadowed the bales of tomatoes and herbs. “It’s one thing to read about various garden ideas, but quite another to actually see these things grow.’
Visitors said the chance to chat with the garden owners was an great resource.
“I’m new to decorating my yard, so I don’t want to make a mistake picking out flowers that don’t go together,” said Susan Schellberg of Hobart. “I love a lot of color too, so it’s interesting to talk to the owners as we go through their gardens. I appreciate their advice.”
Nine vendors, offering everything from metal sculptures to flower-painted glassware, were situated in the courtyard of the Aquatorium.
“I love all of the garden-themed items they sell at these events,” said Marge Derrick of Gary. “There’s always things you can’t find at regular stores, almost all my yard decorations are unexpected finds.”
The two-day event offered a guided tour for bicycling enthusiasts, who chose to cycle instead of walk. Miller Garden Club member Dave Kemeren of Ogden Dunes led the nearly 4.2-mile bike tour, which included hills, inclines, and other topography of the Miller area.
The tour began and ended at the Marquette Park Aquatorium, which is situated at the very southernmost tip of Lake Michigan in the Miller Beach section of Gary.
The building is the former Gary Bathing Beach, where in the early and mid-20th century beachgoers gathered to shower and change into proper bathing attire before walking down to the shore for a dip in Lake Michigan.
Currently, the refurbished structure houses a museum dedicated to flight: honoring the work initiated by Octave Chanute with his gliders, data he freely shared with the Wright Brothers.
In addition, there’s a section of the building named for the Tuskegee Airmen — the famed African-American flying aces of World War II — including a replica of aircraft used in their flights.
The mission of the Miller Garden Club, which was organized in 1998, is to provide gardening education in many areas — to protect native trees, plants and wildlife and to beautify the Miller Beach community in Gary.
Members work on tending gardens along the Lake Street Business district, the South Shore train station, the library, the Aquatorium and many other locations.
For further information, contact Joanne Stratton at (312) 543-1561 or visit online at millergardenclub.org.
