NORTHPORT — Two postage-stamp-sized lots in the Bayside community will showcase their cottage-style gardens during the Belfast Garden Club’s Open Garden Days on Saturday, Aug. 10, from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. Located at 21 and 24 Broadway in Northport, The Elliott Garden and Carlton’s Cottage Garden will offer visitors double insight into small-space gardening in this neighborhood built on a former church campground.

The $5 admission allows entry to both gardens and helps to support the club’s public service projects throughout the year. The event will be held rain or shine.

“The tiny size is a challenge, but a fun challenge,” says Linda Elliott, in a Belfast Garden Club news release. Elliot purchased her Carpenter’s Gothic cottage in 2004 and became a year-round resident in 2018.

“Gardening has always been a favorite creative pastime for me.”

In addition to growing vegetables in a raised bed, Elliott cultivates a perennial garden that wraps around two sides of her cottage. The shade garden at the rear of the house was the only extant garden when she moved in.

“At that time, it was mostly ferns,” she says. “I’ve added heuchera, astilbes, begonias, hostas, Stella d’Oro lilies, Japanese fern, and much more.”

The begonia-filled Portland Foundry urn has been in her family for generations.

Elliott says that some of the inspiration for the garden’s design came from taking garden tours.

“I always find some great ideas on tours,” she says. “And my daughter owns Dandelion Springs Farm, and her amazing gardens and gardening knowledge are always an inspiration.” 

Though Elliott hired Union Stone to install a stone wall around the front and side of the cottage, she does all the gardening herself.

“Bayside is such a wonderful community when one is out working in the garden,” she says. “It soon becomes 50% garden work and 50% socializing.”

The final Open Garden Days event of the summer will be on Saturday, August 17. For the complete Open Garden Days schedule, visit belfastgardenclub.org. Proceeds support the garden club’s school programs, camp scholarships, library donations, and the thirteen public gardens in Belfast that are maintained by club volunteers.