Harmony in Bloom - Kansas City Homes & Style

A Johnson County K-State Extension Master Gardener transforms a blank slate into an extraordinary cottage garden escape.

Story by Ann Butenas | Photography by Matt Kocourek

What began as a lawn, a pool, and three lonely trees has become one of Johnson County’s most celebrated garden retreats. Julie Knutson, a Johnson County K-State Extension Master Gardener, has spent roughly 17 years transforming the grounds of her Prairie Village home into a layered, living landscape that effortlessly blurs the line between private sanctuary and inspired outdoor living. This June, her garden joined the Johnson County Public Garden Tour and visitors were treated to something special.

When Julie and her husband Pete purchased their home in 2009, the property had good bones but little else. The previous owner, a meticulous surgeon, had done everything exactly right in the early 1950s and apparently never touched it again. What the Knutsons inherited was an immaculate lawn, a massive vintage gunite pool complete with a diving board and slide, and virtually no other landscaping to speak of.

“There was not a plant in sight,” Julie recalled of that first winter, when she began sketching out plans for a formal garden outside her kitchen window. “It was so depressing because it was just lawn.”

That formal garden, anchored by a fountain and cedar arbors, became the first of many. Today, the grounds feature a cutting garden, a cottage garden enclosed by a white picket fence, a hydrangea alley, a potting shed area, a kitchen garden with raised beds for tomatoes and herbs, two distinct fire pit areas, sweeping flagstone walkways, and a newer fiberglass pool and patio that replaced the original pool just two years ago. It is a remarkable transformation, built largely by two people with a shared vision, a tolerance for hard work, and a great deal of patience.

Julie credits early inspiration to travel and a stack of well-worn home and garden magazines. Before children, she and her husband were fortunate to see the great gardens of Europe, particularly in England, and she came home with an idea that planting a garden was something like interior decorating: you find what you like, you put it in, and it thrives. The climate of the Midwest quickly taught her otherwise.

“I lost a lot of plants along the way,” she said with a laugh. “But then I started going to symposiums, buying books, reading everything I could. It just got more and more interesting.”

Her path to becoming a Master Gardener came through the Johnson County K-State Extension office, where applicants submit an essay, complete a semester of weekly training courses, and commit to ongoing volunteer hours. Julie completed her certification in 2022 and has since watched her involvement grow far beyond what she initially expected. Rose garden volunteers visited once a week, and a rosarian visited her as her schedule allowed. Some of these dedicated volunteers log upward of 200 hours a year.

One of the garden’s most distinctive features is what Julie calls her hydrangea alley, a long side bed containing every classification of hydrangea imaginable, from Annabelles and Oakleafs to paniculatas and serratas. Climbing hydrangeas scale the north fence. In the front beds, flamethrower redbuds lend drama alongside Little Lime hydrangeas, apricot drift roses, variegated liriope, salvia, boxwoods, lilacs, and Kodiak bush honeysuckles, a newer native selection Julie is embracing as part of an intentional effort to diversify beyond the boxwood hedges she loves but no longer wants to depend on.

Her 190 rose bushes merit their own mention. When someone asked how many she had in preparation for the tour, she took the time to count. Her immediate reaction to the tally?

“Obviously I need 10 more. You can’t have 190,” she smiled.

The cottage garden, tucked in front of the potting shed behind the white picket fence, is where Julie admits the real work lives. Keeping it loose without letting it run wild, achieving the layered, slightly undone look of an English country garden without tipping into chaos, is a daily negotiation.

“It seems like it should be the easiest,” she said, “but it’s the trickiest to get right.”

The patio and pool area underwent its own dramatic evolution two years ago, when the original pool was replaced with a smaller, more elegant fiberglass model in preparation for her son’s rehearsal dinner. The project required housing the entire surrounding garden in Rubbermaid tubs on the driveway while heavy equipment did its work. Nearly everything survived.

The east berm, one of the earliest additions to the property, tells a different story. Builders filled it during the original renovation, and Julie has spent the better part of 17 years amending the soil to correct the damage. It is a good reminder that beautiful gardens are rarely built in a season.

What keeps Julie here, through the hard seasons and the happy ones alike, is something she describes simply as her happy place. She is out there most mornings in pajamas with a cup of coffee, pulling a weed or two before the day starts. As the family prepares to become empty nesters this fall, she has no plans to downsize. There are still beds to deepen, a greenhouse to dream about, and eventually, if luck smiles, grandchildren who might need someone to teach them how to build a fairy house.