Leach Botanical Garden is a favorite desitination for summer weddings
Hidden deep in southeast Portland in the Pleasant Valley neighborhood along Johnson Creek, Leach Botanical garden is a wonderland of the exotic and the native, blended in a style all its own.
It’s been called “Portland’s best kept secret” and no wonder.
“The garden was the outgrowth of John and Lilla Leach’s fascination with plants,” says Nancy Williams, a former staffer at the Garden (along with more than a hundred “Leach Garden Friends’ volunteers). “Lilla was a botanist who discovered five plant species in her lifetime, including one named after her, the Kalmiopsis leachiana.”
In 1931, the Leach’s purchased 4.5 acres of what had been the estate of Jacob Johnson and renamed it “Sleepy Hollow.”
Horticulture Education
Today the garden has grown to over 15 acres and is filled with special collections of penstemon, alpines, medicinal herbs, rock garden plants and camellia species. “Plants are grouped by their botanical need,” notes Williams, “so, for instance, plants suited to drier climates are all together in one area.” Demonstration gardens include the rock garden, the Portland Fuchsia Society garden of hardy species and species groupings for various geographical areas of the U.S. “We have a special focus on the Siskiyou Mountains of southwestern Oregon,” says Williams “particularly the Kalmiopsis wilderness where Lilla did much of her work.”
True to the intent of its founders, Leach Botanical Garden is dedicated to the study of botany and horticulture, but its activities go well beyond the garden proper, with classes, tours, a horticultural library with over 900 books, and a Manor house that serves as a museum and gift shop.
