Flourishing limelight hydrangeas bear witness to the thoughtful revival and sustained maintenance of a century-old estate in Baltimore. The two-plus-acre property, boasting an early 20th-century Georgian-style residence and a dramatic stone terrace, was treated to a major upgrade in 2017. New owners called in landscape architect Jamie Brown to rethink worn features. His program called for regrading a sloping rear yard to create a dramatic incline and central steps linking a stone terrace to a new great lawn. Today, a mass planting of 120 white-blooming dwarf deutzia shrubs blankets the incline. “We wanted a low shrub for erosion control that would also relate to the period of the house,” Brown explains. 

Pinehurst Landscape Company installed the garden elements and provides continuing care, starting with perimeter screening and deer fencing. Hydrangeas enliven a side yard. “The wow factor of the plants has only increased,” says Pinehurst’s Ted Carter. The landscaping “has got a big kapow.”

Improvements include repair of a vintage-stone lily pond, pool upgrades and construction of a gazebo. New, mosaic-patterned quartzite pool decking contrasts with the freeform stonework of the original terrace, which was rebuilt using existing massive slabs of hand-quarried bluestone and new machine-cut bluestone, hand-chiseled and artificially weathered to blend into the legacy landscape. “That’s the coolest thing about this whole project,” says Carter. “It was fun to use the character of stone to its full extent and bring it to life.”

Award: Heritage/Outdoor Living (Pinehurst). Landscape Architecture/Design: Jamie Brown, Beechbrook Landscape Architecture, Baltimore, Maryland. Contractor: Paglia Contracting, Forest Hill, Maryland. Landscape Installation: Pinehurst Landscape Company, Glen Arm, Maryland.