Grand Prize
	Joan and Richard Kinsman, gardeners who keep on the go, pause here at their greenhouse, where they over-winter banana plants, ferns, jade plants and other tender ornamentals. They designed their award-winning woodland garden from the bare ground up, and continue to work in it daily.

Today the whole comes close to expressing the Kinsmans' vision of an island paradise, where living quarters and garden harmonize. Gravel paths wind through undulating planting beds where well-chosen groupings of shrubs, perennials and trees provide year-round interest. A pavilion and sculptures large and small add structure, while a pond, bird feeders and nesting boxes attract wildlife.

Judges in the ninth annual Pacific Northwest Competition for Home Gardeners awarded this garden the grand prize: a trip for two to London for the 2002 Chelsea Flower Show, admission to the show and five nights' lodging. The contest is sponsored by The Seattle Times' Pacific Northwest magazine and the Northwest Flower & Garden Show, and administered by The Arboretum Foundation. More than 100 home gardeners from King, Snohomish and Pierce counties as well as Bainbridge Island entered.

Joan recalls they weren't thinking in terms of a huge project, much less a garden contest, when they assessed the bare ground around their house. They simply picked up tools and went from phase to phase, first submitting their general design for neighborhood review. (They live in a planned community with covenants to protect the forest and homeowners' views, so design approval is standard.)

Richard Kinsman had seen salamanders but had only heard the frogs at his garden pool until Seattle Times photographer Mike Siegel captured this one on film.

They placed plants so height and form balance vertically and horizontally. There is ample variety in leaf texture and color, and a broad palette of greens organizes the visual harmony into a series of lively dioramas. For example, the kitchen window frames a birch (Betula jacquemontii) and dracemia, complemented by violets, bishop's weed and peonies. The view from the main deck is an intriguing array of foliage, including two cherry trees. One, Prunus autumnaus, is a winter bloomer.

Bordering their pond, which snuggles near the living-room French doors and adjoining deck, are Japanese iris, gunnera, hostas, astilbes and houttuynia. Nandina and cotinus grow near the house, as does a Japanese styrax (snowbell tree). Deer ferns, euonymus and heather line the front walk. Eventually, every plant in the entry area will be evergreen.

Paths lead where feet want to go. The terrain is naturally sloping; one bark-covered trail leads down and loops back through a shallow ravine at the property line. Shrubs and trees are larger as you descend the path and enter the understory of the embracing woods, where towering firs sketch a backdrop that a bare-land gardener can only dream about.

Contest judges were impressed by the well-integrated design. All the pieces — house, woodland garden, pond, cutting garden and outdoor art — fit to serve the whole.

	Mark Jackson of Duncan, B.C., created this 9-foot-high totem pole depicting Raven as a signature piece for the Kinsmans' property. Native carvers taught Jackson carving techniques. The house and carport are in the distance.

Off to one side and out of view of the house, raised beds filled with herbs, roses and perennials grown for cut flowers borrow the space above the sanitation drain field, which is close to a public road. In season, the colors here are the most vivid on the property. Even so, the palette is blues, pinks and whites.

By May of 1999, the couple started work on pathways and staked out areas for shrubs. Just the cleanup of years of detritus from their thickly wooded property "took forever," Joan recalls. Using their design as a basic map, they supervised excavation of the pond and terrace areas, retaining walls, decks and the pavilion. The rest came from their own hands, backs and brains.

Richard started with the certainty that curved paths and planting beds were the key to a natural-looking landscape, the couple's primary goal. He did not like the appearance of thin bender board, so he took long 3/4-inch cedar boards, set them on end between wooden stakes, kept them moist and bent them in increments by repositioning the stakes. In time, he had forms for all the beds near the house, which he later filled with topsoil and 50 yards of emu-fertilizer compost from Poulsbo.

They bought immature plants, shuffled the containers around until they were optimally positioned and dug them in. In one instance, Richard rented a power auger and spent a long afternoon boring through compressed glacial till to plant just five trees.

Joan bought this statue years ago as a birthday present for Richard. It had been at the shop for so long, employees had named it "Eleanor," and were sorry to see her go. The name stuck.

The Kinsmans, now retired, were trained in art and design — John had been art director for a public-television station, and Joan an art teacher — so they had no trouble sketching the plan. And they had planted backyard gardens in other Seattle-area homes, but this was the first time they'd worked on such a grand scale.

"We were both artists, so we could visualize how it would be," Richard says. "As an amateur, though, you're testing things — leaf color, size. There is trial and error."

There were times when this shared talent was not necessarily an advantage, Joan recalls. "When you both have an opinion about art and design, you need to be willing to negotiate." And to realize Douglas firs and big-leaf maples have the final say. These native trees remain the dominant force in the neighborhood.

Their biggest problem, aside from a ravenous deer herd, is finding what will grow where, Joan says. Last spring, an old maple came down to make room for the pavilion — a birthday present for Richard — and by summer the understory plants, including coreopsis and ligularia, sizzled in the midday sun.

"We had planted it all for the maple. Now there's a period of adjustment because of the new corridor of light coming in." In fringe areas, they're to the point where they need to control or remove some trees, hybrid firs that will someday outgrow their space.

Because they rely on a community well, they use drip irrigation, for the most part. A carefully monitored sprinkler tower mists moisture-loving plants in the summer. They avoid poison sprays and other materials that might taint the ground water, and top off the main garden with emu compost periodically.

The Kinsmans find inspiration in books and TV programs and what's right out the back door. Nurseries have been their classrooms, the everyday projects their best teachers.

"This garden kept us moving," Richard says. "We've learned a lot and never stop learning."

There are a number of pretty places to sit in this garden, though the Kinsmans don't do much of that at this point in their lives. Someday, perhaps, they'll lean back in their chairs and say, "We did it for us."

	The Kinsmans showed their friend Tony Hurtado of Vancouver, Wash., a photo they had taken of a desk-top sculpture in Arizona. Hurtado fashioned this near-man-sized outdoor version out of sheet metal for them. The Kinsmans have dubbed it "Tony."

About the Judges
More than 100 gardens were entered in the ninth-annual Pacific Northwest Competition for Home Gardeners. Teams of garden-savvy judges — volunteers trained and guided by the Arboretum Foundation staff — rated each, using a point system and scoring sheets. Factors included overall design, plant use, diversity of plant material and so on. Gardens that made the first cut were advanced to second-round judging, where different teams of judges viewed and assessed. For the final, third round, judges were Bob Lilly, a plant broker well-known for his work on the Bellevue Botanical Garden perennial border; Don Marshall, director of the horticultural program at Kirkland's Lake Washington Technical College; and Bill Williamson, a landscape architect. These judges, who saw the top three gardens on one day in late July, were escorted by Arboretum volunteers Mary Ellen and Gordon Mulder. Contest coordinator was Janet Endsley.

The gazebo replaced an old and decaying bigleaf maple and opened a new area for entertaining. This view looks toward the house.

Richard Kinsman nailed together an old window frame and other scrap wood to make a rustic hanging planter for seasonal flowers. The Kinsmans believe in sharing with their fellow residents, including the many birds attracted to the surrounding woods and nearby pools.

Dean Stahl is a Seattle writer, editor and lexicographer. Mike Siegel is a Seattle Times staff photographer.