Kenjockety

In 1994 Dan Kiley was hired to design a Modernist garden for the lake house of artists Joel Shapiro and Ellen Phelan, located on Lake Champlain across from Kiley’s home and studio in Charlotte, Vermont. Their Prairie Style house was built in 1910 on the north end of Barber Point. The picturesque estate, now 40 acres, also includes a carriage house, an icehouse, a converted garage, a boathouse and a masonry pumphouse.

Along the public approach road Kiley planted a 1000-foot long, Lombardy poplar allée that frames views of the surrounding open fields. The entrance drive, oriented 90 degrees from the road, runs between the edge of white cedar woodlands and a row of tea crabapples. In the adjacent field, a vine-covered pergola and vegetable garden look out to the poplar allée.

Near the house Kiley created a rectilinear garden scheme that connects the various outbuildings with the main house. The gravel parking court incorporates a 30-foot diameter circle of yew with a small fountain in the center. The edge of the court, supported by a four-foot retaining wall, features one of Shapiro’s sculptures with Lake Champlain as its backdrop. The house entrance is marked by an extended wooden pergola set on concrete columns that projects from the door towards the cedar woodlands. The adjacent rectangular lawn is edged with beds of tulips and peonies planted by Phelan.

Kenjockety is included in the Camp Dudley Road Historic District, listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1993.