JUSTINE HEILNER LANDSCAPE

This folly is hidden in the woods on a 500-acre estate in eastern Long Island. The Welltower was recently re-built, as a place to stay overnight and needed to be knitted back into the forest, without losing the sense of surprise and wonder that visitors would share when arriving on foot or on horseback.

The basic design themes are as follows:

• Reducing the driveway to a simple parking area and turnaround - emphasizing the approach on foot or horseback. The area that transitions back into the woods and stream was planted with deschampsia plugs, a tall soft grass that catches the light in a wonderful way.
• Re-grading the area directly around the house to let it sit more naturally on the ground - rather than hovering above as it did when construction was complete. This flat area becomes a platform for sitting and looking out to the woods and ocean.
• A ring of Royal Fern was planted that will be visible at times from afar as a thin line of color, while also holding the space immediately around the Welltower. The ferns have an ephemeral effect, with an intense visual impact in the fall, when they turn gold.
• Nyssa grove. The transition down to the stream and wood beyond was quite barren post-construction. We made it more graceful and also in fall, dramatic with color. This area was also under planted with deschampsia species to soften the ground level.