Harvest Moon Garden Renovation
-The following first appeared in The Floyd Press on April 1, 2021.
Spring is the season for raking, weeding, clipping, digging and planting, and there’s been a lot of that going on at the Harvest Moon Food Store’s front entrance.
“It’s getting a facelift,” said Allison Bowden, one of the co-owners of Juneberry Gardens, a Blacksburg-based landscaping company that does consultations, garden design, installation and maintenance.
Bowden, a Floyd resident who grew up in Floyd and Blacksburg, was one of a crew of six working on the Harvest Moon’s perennial garden renovation. The garden was originally designed by Pamela Cadmus when the store moved in 2005 from downtown (where Country Sales is now located) into its new larger building, which also currently houses The Parkway Grille restaurant.
Bowden explained that Cadmus, who heads up Specialty Garden Design, passed the job onto Juneberry because she is only doing consulting and design now, although she was on site to help out.
“We’re working together to share her vision. We’re adding and not taking too much away, but some things have timed out and have become weed-ridden,” Bowden said.
For those who grocery shop at The Moon – which has been a community hub since its food-coop beginnings more than 35 years ago – and enjoy the seasonal daffodils, peonies and echinacea flowers that line the walkway and the sitting pagoda and patio, they are still there.
Sydney Darden, Bowden’s Juneberry business partner, said that some invasive grasses in the garden were dug up and some large boxwood shrubs were clipped and moved. Darden began her landscaping business, Darden’s Garden, in 2013 and partnered with Bowden in 2018, changing the name to Juneberry.
“It was a lucky find,” she said about partnering with Bowden.
On Monday, the workers were in wide brimmed hats to protect them from the full sun. The next day it was cool and damp and most wore wooly knit caps. They were not deterred by the weather as they carried on with their work, planting and spreading mulch. Bowden reported that they were adding ironweed, coral bells, geraniums and more to the mix.
