It is done.

Ms. Caroline Burgess, Director
Stonecrop Gardens
81 Stonecrop Lane
Cold Spring, NY 10516

Dear Ms. Burgess:

I visited Stonecrop earlier this year on the advice of a fellow member of the North American Rock Garden Society and instantly fell in love with the facility. The collections of alpines, troughs, and rockeries, particularly the ledge garden, were as beautiful as any I have ever seen, in print or in person. When I realized that Stonecrop offered an internship program, I contacted your office and learned more from both Barbara Scoma and Robin Young. Based on everything I have learned about Stonecrop, I would like to apply for an internship.

While I am currently employed as a professional geologist and project manager, I am also a lifelong gardening enthusiast who has long considered a transition to a career in horticulture. I believe my combination of work experience and interest in plants makes me an ideal candidate for an internship. I work well independently and as part of a team, and I have several years of supervisory experience. I am as comfortable in the office environment as I am in the outdoors getting my hands dirty. I am always willing to put in the extra time required to complete a task correctly and in a timely manner. As a geologist, I bring a unique perspective to the culture of alpine plants as well as an appreciation of the manner in which plants interact with their surrounding environment.

As a plantsman, I am active in both the Mason-Dixon and Potomac Valley chapters of the North American Rock Garden Society. I’ve developed a particular interest in trough culture, and believe the required attention to detail would serve me well in any garden endeavor. My love of plants leads me to visit nurseries and botanical gardens whenever I travel, photographing every new plant that I see. This enthusiasm would be a tremendous asset to Stonecrop Gardens.

Enclosed please find my resume for your review. Thank you for your time and consideration. I will contact you in the next two weeks to see if you require any additional information.

Sincerely,


Gimpadelic

Make a Rock Garden

"I advise you sincerely that if you have in your garden a bit of a slope, or a small terrace, make a rock garden there. In the first place, such a rock garden is very beautiful when it is grown over with cushions of saxifrage, aubrieta, alyssum, wall cress, and other very nice little alpine flowers; secondly, because making a rock garden is itself a splendid and fascinating exercise. A man who buids a rock garden feels himself to be a cyclops when he, so to speka, with elemental power, piles stone upon stone, createshills and dales, transports mountain and erects rocky cliffs. Later when, with aching back he has finished his gigantic masterpiece, he finds that it looks rather different from the romantic mountain which he had in mind; and it seems to be only a heap of rubble and stones. But don't worry; in a year these stones will change in to a most beautiful bed, sparkling with tiny flowers, and grown over with nice green cushions; and your pleasure will be great. I tell you, make a rock garden."

-Karel Capek

The Well Inspired Garden

The scenes of beauty I seek to create in my gardens and troughs are inspired by things that I see in the rest of the world. All these inspiring things were in and around Center Ossipee, NH.

These sites encouraged and inspired this "clean-up" of a mossy boulder:

As well as this crevice planting in a bedrock outcrop:

of Sempervivum arachnoideum, Miniature Stonecrop (Sedum requieni), and Erysimum kotschyanum 'Orange Flame'

OK then. What next?

New Plants

I have some inspiring nature shots from my recent trip to NH, but in the meantime, here are the newest additions to the (foolishly) ever-growing collection.

Zig-Zag Club Moss (Selaginella sanguinolenta var. compressa)

Ilex crenata 'Dwarf Pagoda'

Ezo Spruce (Picea jenzonensis)

Dwarf Sawara Cypress (Chamaecyparis psifera)