Blithewold’s rock garden was the favorite of Bessie Pardee Van Wickle Mc Kee, the lady of the manor at the turn of the 19th century. She called it Little Mt. Hope, and had a great deal of influence in its design and the selection of its featured small-scale plantings, and evergreen trees and shrubs. Likewise, the water garden, with its water lily-filled pond, arched stone bridge, and Asian-inspired landscape elements, was a collaboration between the outgoing landscape architect John DeWolf, Blithewold’s first caretaker, John Best, and Bessie.

For about a century, these gardens delighted the Van Wickle and Mc Kee family, friends and guests, and more recently the public. And for most of that time, they existed in close proximity — but not under — the harbor.

That changed in recent years as a combination of sea level rise, sublimating land, and an increase in the number and severity of coastal storms meant that virtually every full moon high tide or northeast storm was sending Bristol Harbor flowing freely into the century-old gardens located at the northwestern corner of the property.

The salt water infiltration was damaging to the many plants chosen to complement the space and the design of the garden at the time, but not for their tolerance to salt water.

A 100-year plan

The horticultural staff at Blithewold has known for several years that something needed to be done.

“For the last 20 years we've been aware of more and more consistent flood events, storm surges, high water in the harbor,” said Dan Christina, Blithewold’s chief horticulturalist. “We first started off with a project with Roger Williams that looked at many different strategies and the FEMA flood plane maps for this area that were showing just how high up water is expected to go in the next 100 years…This is a 100-year minimum project.

“There’s been a real emphasis on ‘we should do something’ in the last decade.”

The last three years included planning, engineering, and permitting, and actual construction lasted from October 2025 to May 31, 2026. The total cost, including engineering and construction, was $300,000.

A big, beautiful berm

The 650-foot earthen berm that Blithewold has built will not only prevent storm and high tide infiltration, it will allow for the continued capture of surface water and runoff down to that low-lying area of the property.

“One of the key components of all this accepted, permitted reconstruction of coastal landscaping was improving our existing salt marsh by tripling it,” said Christina. “So it went from about 2,400 square feet to 8,800 square feet.

“It can absorb three times as much storm water activity, three times as much storm surge, three times as much coastal flooding…That will permit the proper kind of water infiltration, and then enable outflow back to the bay, which will also help mitigate the wetness around the garden, even in times when there has not been recent infiltration.”

Reimagining Bessie’s vision

Blithewold is currently in the final, replanting stage of the berm project. Christina has delegated that task to Caitlin Ndoye, a horticulturalist who came to Blithewold from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden about 3 years ago. She is Blithewold’s resident rock garden specialist and manager, and she took the lead selecting the plants that will remain true to the garden’s aesthetic while maintaining the resilience needed for the exposed site.

“It started in the winter with lots of dreaming and coming up with lists of things that were inspired by either gardens I had visited or had worked in previously or longed to visit,” said Ndoye. “So it was sort of like a a dream wish list…I was looking at some historical plant lists that Dan provided which were fascinating and made me feel a lot better when I saw how much how much change had happened in the garden. It also indicated the flooding situations that happened and how things did not always make it. But they were always experimenting with things which felt very inspiring.

“And obviously the priority too is plants that can be by the sea.”
Constrained a bit by what they could actually source and the timing of the seasons also influenced Ndoye’s choices.

“It had many many iterations and I'm very pleased with where we're at. It will forever be a work in progress. So that's the other part that I love,” she said.

“We tried to maintain part of the larger elements of the garden that were preserved through many iterations of the rock garden space…this upper portion with the yews and the asters that's been planted out with ferns and the mums…that section's persisted through the last 40 or 50 years regardless of how the rest of the designs of the garden have changed,” said Christina.

“We want to make sure that what we're putting in is appropriate for the location, but isn’t too far-reaching in its spreading ability. We want to make them persist here without showing up in other parts of the landscape.

“Caitlin's doing a really amazing job with that. This place has never looked better, honestly.”

With 450 trees and shrubs on the berm and maybe a thousand annuals and perennials throughout the rest of the space, Ndoye is almost done — with this phase. There’s more seasons to account for, so that the gardens are visually interesting all year, and the gardens are always evolving. But the berm is already proven its worth. Christina believes it has prevented at least 4 inundations already.

“I’ve photographed at least four,” he said. “For us in Bristol Harbor in the summer, these are generally during the new moon high tides, when we get water cresting over the road. As we head into the winter months, it tends to be both new and full moons and then it'll be the two or three days on either side of the maximum high tides.”

Now Christina and Ndoye just keep their fingers crossed that all will survive the winter. “You never know what you're going to get,” said Ndoye. “But that's all part of the maddening and humbling aspect of gardening.”