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Trade Secrets Returns This Weekend
A display at Trade Secrets 2007; photograph by Lisa Sheble
Trade Secrets is not such a secret anymore. Like a well-tended garden, the rare plant and garden antiques sale grows lusher and more interesting every year, raising ever more money for Women’s Support Services, the not-for-profit agency that provides aid to victims of domestic violence in northwestern Connecticut and nearby New York and Massachusetts. “It’s gratifying to see how it’s become a major event on gardeners’ calendars,” says Naomi Blumenthal of Alford, who helped found Trade Secrets in 2001 at interior designer Bunny Williams‘s property in Falls Village, CT, where she was then head gardener. Trade Secrets is both earthy and elegant—it has the ambiance of the sort of country fair you’d see featured in an English gardening magazine. For the third year in a row, it will be held at Lion’s Rock Farm on Route 41 on the Sharon/Salisbury border. The 50 vendors take great care not only with the merchandise they choose to bring but also with composing the vignettes in their tented booths. “We love participating in Trade Secrets—it’s an annual reunion of passionate plantspeople and experts who we know and admire,” says Bob Hyland of Loomis Creek Nursery. Indeed, Trade Secret veterans “love to reminisce about the second Trade Secrets at Bunny’s house when it snowed,” says Blumenthal. “If I could wish for anything it would be for good weather.”
But cold, wind and rain never deter competitive gardeners like Anne Bass, Carolyne Roehm, Martha Stewart, Oscar de la Renta, and Bunny Williams, who are usually among the early buyers and who ask probing questions of vendors such as David Burdick Daffodils and Glendale Botanicals. You can also shop for country antiques (from dealers such as Dawn Hill and Treillage), rare garden tomes (from Johnnycake Books), handmade clay pots (by Guy Wolff), and outdoor sculpture (from The White Gallery and Battle Hill Forge). The planning committee is especially excited about a new vendor, Barbara Israel, who many consider the authority on antique garden ornaments.
Day Two of Trade Secrets is devoted to garden tours. “We have four this year,” says co-chair Judith Linscott. “Bunny Williams’s garden is always included because it is beloved. People just love going back to it again and again. In Salisbury, there’s Robin Magowan’s rock garden and the grand Twin Maples and Helen Bodian’s wonderful woodlands in Millerton. There’s a realistic element to all these gardens, so you can borrow ideas. You don’t need $10 million and three full-time gardeners to emulate them.”
Trade Secrets
Saturday May 17
Early Buying: 8 AM to 10 AM, $100 (includes buffet breakfast)
Regular Admission: 10 AM - 3 PM, $35
Sunday May 18
Garden Tours: 10 AM - 4 PM, $60 ($50 if purchased in advance)
