Gibbs Gardens: Family hobby shared with world

Ball Ground, Ga. — Perhaps it was inevitable. When Margaret Gibbs gave birth to a son, Jim Gibbs, at Murphy General Hospital in 1942, she was already a blue-ribbon winner of the Murphy Garden Club.

She was so good, in fact, that after winning another first-place ribbon one year, she overheard one of the ladies from her garden club say, “If Mrs. Gibbs enters next year, there’s no sense in me entering. She’s going to win it.”

The following year, Gibbs’ mother did not enter, but instead taught other women in town about gardening. However, it wasn’t just Gibbs’ mother who had a passion for flowers. His grandmother and great grandmother were both avid gardeners, as well as his four aunts.

So what was a young boy to do but learn how to build and grow flower gardens? Eventually, Jim Gibbs would grow his family hobby into a world-class, award-winning 327-acre floral garden.

But first there was the weeding.

“I grew up in a household talking about gardening,” Gibbs said, “you take it all in.”

‘Enjoy it like I do’

His grandmother raised his mother and four aunts on a 1,000-acre Antebellum farm just outside of Spartanburg, S.C.

“She let them cut flowers and bring in to decorate the rooms,” Gibbs said with a laugh. “They lived out in the country and she said it kept them busy.”

As a young boy, Gibbs grew up outside playing in any number of the family gardens, as all five sisters planted gardens in their homes as well. His mother taught him gardening from the basics.

“Nobody likes to weed,” Gibbs said. He often grumbled to his mother about all the time he spent weeding her garden.

“She would say, ‘Jimmy, you’ve got to learn to weed so you don’t pick the flowers.’ ” He swore he’d never had a garden when he grew up.

“I would work in my mother’s garden and complain,” Gibbs said. “I told her, ‘I’m never going to have any garden or flowers at my house.’ ”

His mother took it all in stride. “Remember,” she told him, “when you have your own house you can do what you want to do, install and maintain what you like; you will enjoy it like I do.”

A mother must know best, because Gibbs knew by high school that he wanted to be a professional gardener.

‘Just full of color’

Gibbs said he loved growing up in Cherokee County.

“We had a summer cabin at Hiawassee Lake, near Great Creek just past Hanging Dog,” he recalled. “Murphy was a beautiful place to grow up.”

Except for the winters. In the 1950s, many houses were heated with a coal stoker that burned into a big furnace, but the system was inefficient and Gibbs was often cold.

“I didn’t care much about the winters in Murphy; it could be pretty rough,” Gibbs said, then laughed. “The insulation was not as thick, back in those days.”

But how he loved spring and summer.

“In the spring, when the perennials bloom, it’s just full of color,” Gibbs said, adding, “The lavenders of Russian sage, the yellow daffodils, with their warm colors, it is just beautiful.”

Before he left for the University of Georgia, his mother told him that there were two types of gardening.

“If you’re very creative,” she told him, “you’ll go into more of the design and planning of gardens. But if you want to know how plants grow, you’ll need to learn horticulture.”

Gibbs said his family knew early on he had talent for the creative side. But he wanted to know all aspects of gardening, so he studied both landscape architecture for the design side and horticulture for the knowledge side.

He stayed in Georgia after graduation.

“Georgia is a big, big gardening state,” Gibbs said. “There are more gardening clubs in Atlanta than in any other city.”

With his degree, he opened his own business, Gibbs Landscape Co., and over the years earned more than 300 awards for excellence in design.

‘World-class garden’

Gibbs began traveling the world to learn more about gardens, flowers and design.

“When I was studying in Japan, I told my wife that I wanted to find a piece of property and begin to build a world-class garden,” he said.

Gibbs wanted that garden to be his legacy. So they moved back to Georgia, purchased 350 acres and built a Manor House on the property. Then he got to work digging 19 ponds and multiple waterfalls, while designing 16 gardens, each with its own specialty.

Gibbs Gardens won the national award for the Garden of Excellence in 2019, only to top that in 2020 when it was named one of the 13-best American botanical gardens.

“I have hundreds of springs that flow through the gardens,” he said. “All that water ends up in the Cherokee County Reservoir.

“I turned 80 years old in June. Every morning, early in the morning, first thing I do is go out into the gardens.”

Gibbs said he walks about 45 minutes through the springs and ponds.

“I like seeing the changing light on the plant materials” he said. “I have a huge Ferndale shade garden; it’s so peaceful and restful with the waterfall. I do that every morning. I get so much joy from it.”

Gibbs said gardening continues to teach him patience.

“Weather is unpredictable, labor is unpredictable, put the two together, and you have to have to learn to have patience and to deal with it,” he said.

He wishes he had learned patience early.

“When I was younger, I did not have the patience. Today, I accept so many things that are out of my control,” Gibbs said. “Why do I worry about this or that? I know it is out of my control. Today, I have truly accepted that fact that I don’t have control.”

Gibbs’ favorite time to enjoy the gardens is in the cool of the morning.

“The garden is at peace then. Everything is fresh and alive,” he said. “There is nothing to see but the beauty of it. I’m not disturbed there.”