The Cambria Shores Inn’s coastal garden has grown into a work of art
Cambria’s Moonstone Beach boardwalk draws tourists and locals alike. One of the unexpected treats on this walk paralleling the ocean is a view of the Cambria Shores Inn and its coastal garden. Almost vertical in places, colors blend, fuse, twirl and beckon viewers along the boardwalk to cross the street and take a closer look.
Like many paintings of the Impressionist era, views from both a distance and close up are intriguing. Like the elephant seals up the coast, it calls to you.
Inn owners Leslie and Kim Eady continued a legacy of family ownership by passing along inn management and renovation duties to son Sean Wilkinson.
Eldest son Nick Wilkinson, owner of retail nursery Grow in Cambria and Left Field in San Luis Obispo, is agarden designer and has overseen the garden transformation.
“We had a small budget for plants so everything we planted was small at first,” he explained. “People commented about the modest size of the plants and had serious doubts about our vision. The following year local garden clubs toured and were impressed by the growth and the beauty.”
“It’s such a blessing to have my family working here,” Leslie Eady said. She and her husband bought the inn in 1998. Renovations began in 2006. Nick Wilkinson was an art major with an intense interest in plants and landscaping. He drew freehand sketches of how the garden would look after nearly an acre of lawn was removed. The turf was torn out down to bare rock. New soil was brought in and mounded to various heights. Additional rock came from local quarries.
Cambria’s water moratorium meant careful planning, so visitors would be comfortable and the garden would still thrive. Drought-resistant double dwarf bonsai fescue turf and succulent plants filled the bill. Non-potable water from a well is hauled in once a week to irrigate small portions of the garden.
“That garden rarely gets watered. Before the moratorium we were watering five times a year. It just shows that you can have a dynamic garden and not have to water a lot,” Wilkinson said.
Gabriel Frank of Gardens by Gabriel installed the irrigation system and landscaping. Jan Moon, manager at Grow, comes in once a week to do detail pruning and cleanup for this showstopper of a garden.
Adelaide stone planters front the rooms and raise the plants up for a closer view. They also form a viewing terrace off the entrance where guests can lounge in iconic turquoise Adirondack chairs. The Pacific, Hearst Castle, seabirds, surfers, otters, dolphins, seals and Leffingwell Point and the lighthouse at Piedras Blancas are all part of the view.
Serpentine rock edging surrounds the planters, which brim over with an abundant variety of succulents; some shoot skyward and others scramble over the rocks and gravel. Several varieties of agave and aloe dominate the planters, which spill down the hillside to the street. One species of agave, called sharkskin, mirrors the texture of its namesake.
Euphorbias, sedums, kalanchoes and showy, ruffled pink echevarias fill in around the large, upright anchor plants. Large daisylike aeoniums bring round softness and play well against the sharp edges of the pointy-leafed varieties. African daisies add their blooms to the color-filled mosaic.
Leslie Eady said that every day someone mentions the garden and asks: “What’s this?’” The entire family is good about answering that question, although they do have some fun with it. Sean Wilkinson smiled as he asked, “How do you like our giant asparagus?” The specimen agave he was talking about is in the process of pushing up a bloom stalk that could ultimately reach 12 or more feet in height.
Flagstones that are the size of large coffee tables offer pathways through the lawn and down the slope. Bright orange California poppies bring their good cheer to the spring art palette.
Mr. Happy, a hybrid echium, puts up a 6-foot tall pink flower spike to demonstrate he also is really happy in this garden by the sea. He isn’t the only one. “I feel really proud of what Sean and Jan and I have done over the last year in reworking the garden. It’s now a showcase that has all the beauty any garden would want to have year round,” Nick Wilkinson said.
This story was originally published May 27, 2015 at 6:29 AM with the headline "The Cambria Shores Inn’s coastal garden has grown into a work of art."