From Garden Soil to Evening Dress: Irma Franzen-Heinrichsdorff’s Horticultural Education

April 26, 2017

On this day, the gardens of history parted their foliage to reveal a most fascinating figure - one Irma Franzen-Heinrichsdorff, whose story The Cultural Landscape Foundation saw fit to unearth for our collective enlightenment. A German-born landscape architect whose hands once tilled the same sacred soil that many of us now cultivate with considerably less discipline, I daresay.

It appears that in 1913, young Irma found herself at the Elmwood School of Gardening, an establishment of such rigor that it would make our modern horticultural education seem like mere dabbling. Decades later, in the twilight of the 1980s, she committed her experiences to paper - ten handwritten pages of what can only be described as a testament to gardening devotion that would make even the most committed among us blush with inadequacy.

Allow me to share her words, which speak volumes of an era when gardening was not merely a weekend distraction but a vocation pursued with military precision:

"At 10:15 we went outside and did the currently necessary work in the fruit, vegetable or flower garden.

Every kind of vegetable was cultivated.
Countless flowers were multiplied through seeds, cuttings, etc. to be sold in the spring or fall.

The morning hours passed quickly.

At 1 o'clock we stopped work.

At 1:30 we had lunch, and at 2:30 we went back to work until 4:30.

We then drank tea and at 7 o'clock we appeared in festive evening dress for dinner.

In the summer we had the same hours of work except for an extra hour in our greenhouse from 7 to 8 o'clock to water and spray our thirsty plants.

But I must add, even if it means praising ourselves, that we did not content ourselves with the times I indicated.

We were often found in the garden at 6 o'clock if not at 5 o'clock or even earlier.

Also in the evenings we preferred to be active outside.

Miss Wheeler had never had students as eager as we were."

One cannot help but marvel at such dedication! Rising before dawn to commune with seedlings while the rest of civilization slumbered? Appearing in "festive evening dress for dinner" after hours of soil-encrusted labor? My dear readers, this was gardening as both science and social ritual, a far cry from our contemporary habit of hurriedly watering the begonias while still in pajamas.

Imagine, if you will, the scene at Elmwood: young women transforming from dirt-smudged apprentices to proper dinner guests within the span of hours, their hands bearing the subtle calluses of true horticultural commitment.

And what of this mysterious Miss Wheeler, whose standards were apparently so lofty that even Irma and her cohort's exceptional enthusiasm warranted special mention? One suspects she was the sort of formidable garden mistress who could identify an improperly pruned rose from fifty paces and deliver a withering critique that would leave modern gardening instructors quaking in their Wellington boots.

Most revealing is their preference to be "active outside" during evening hours when conventional wisdom might suggest rest was in order. Such was their passion for cultivation! They multiplied "countless flowers" through propagation methods that today's gardeners consult YouTube tutorials to master, and they did so without complaint, even adding extra hours to their already rigorous schedule.

We modern gardeners, with our ergonomic tools and weather apps, might do well to reflect upon Irma's testament. The next time you find yourself reluctant to deadhead the dahlias or turn the compost, remember the students of Elmwood, rising at five to tend their botanical charges before breakfast, and perhaps shame will motivate where passion falters!