Janice Parker Designs a Landscape in Fairfield, Connecticut

Fall is spectacular on this Fairfield property. Referring to the ancient sugar maples pictured in this view from the house, landscape architect Janice Parker says: “There’s a special charm when the leaves change color and fall. I just love that orange sprinkle on the grass under a tree.”

One of four gates that open onto the formal garden, this one is near the entry court. Layered for a lush look in every season, perennials surround a trellis and urn inspired by an iconic garden ornament from Dumbarton Oaks. You can catch a glimpse of cherry trees beyond the garden and the pool area.

Parker planted sugar maples and crabapple trees along the driveway toward the garage, which also houses guest quarters.

A lovely existing porch serves as another outdoor living space. The plantings there just needed a little rehabilitation, says Parker. An outsized chess board adds a bit of whimsy to the area just below the porch.

This view is from the courtyard in front of the house, by the widening peastone driveway. Parker’s design incorporates ground cover, boxwood, and curved borders to give the landscape movement and definition.

The landscape features quite a lot of lush liriope, or lilyturf (it looks like grass but technically isn’t), that moves with the wind. It’s one of Parker’s go-to plantings because of its purple or white flower spikes in fall—but mainly because of its rhythmic swirl.

Janice Parker’s Vision for a Fairfield, Connecticut, Landscape

Guided by a passion for all things that grow out of the ground (but especially trees), landscape architect Janice Parker is a visionary with a practiced eye. Thanks to some creative thinking and a comprehensive plan, this four-plus-acre property on a former farm in Fairfield has come into its own. “It is an absolutely gorgeous site,” says Parker, principal of Janice Parker Landscape Architects in Greenwich. She was intent on honoring the property’s old-growth trees, the kind you’d find on the grounds of a villa. “The site was just so elegant,” she says. “That’s what we were going for, a subtle old-villa ambience, definitely not suburban, anything but suburban.”

At the heart of her design is a lovingly restored home and the way it relates to its surroundings. She added a formal garden, sweeping borders, ground cover, grasses, perennials, hardscape, a new pool—and more trees. “I’m a tree person,” she says simply. “I like perennials and shrubs okay. But trees? Now we’re talking.”

Parker took a fresh approach and chose plantings that curve and move together in the wind. “A matrix of taller, moving shrubs and grasses is one of the few truly new practices to come along in landscape design in a century,” she says. Parker showcased seasonal color at the rear of the house with limelight hydrangeas that “go from chartreuse to white to champagne to russet bronze.”

Creating a Dramatic Arrival Sequence

The arrival sequence was redefined—from the street, to the trees planted in orchard formation along the driveway, to the main entrance. “We faced an age-old problem,” she says. “Too often, you drive up and all you see is the garage, or you drive up and have no idea where the front door is located.”

In this case, the front door was inside a porch, so Parker designed a central court that directs you to the door. The court aligns with the new four-square garden that leads to the pool and beyond, to a glorious weeping copper beech.

The project pays homage to the antique house and its surroundings, with geometry that echoes the plat maps of old. And yet it’s fresh, not antiquated, a lovely melding of old and new.

Project Team
Landscape design: Janice Parker Landscape Architects