Woodlanders – Reloaded

Last week, we were thrilled to welcome the staff of SC’s Woodlanders Nursery to visit JLBG. We have been huge fans of this small nursery, based in Aiken SC, since its inception in the late 1970s. Woodlanders was founded by architects, Robert and Julia Macintosh (deceased), who settled in Aiken, SC in the 1970s, after a stint in Grenada. In 1982, they were joined by Grenada’s George Mitchell and Colonial Williamsburg horticulturist, Bob McCartney, both as minority co-owners. Through the years, I’ve had the pleasure of botanizing with Bob, both in North and South America, and when visiting Woodlanders, had the chance to stay overnight at the Robert and Julia’s home, although I did pass on the after dinner ritual of a nude swim in their lake, filled with an assortment of snakes and gators.

The nursery, which was never designed as a moneymaker, would have long ago vanished, had the owners required more than a minimal subsistence salary. Other than an efficient working layout, the main thing lacking at Woodlanders were business practices that encouraged customers to buy plants. Bob could be a bit brusque, especially with customers north of the Mason-Dixon line, with policies that wouldn’t allow shipments on orders received after mid-March. Bob seemed proud of his business motto, “Woodlanders, the toughest plant you’ll ever try to buy.”. On site sales were also strictly forbidden.

Despite these challenges, Woodlanders has long been a source of amazing horticultural rarities for gardeners in hot summer climates. Many plants like the famed Sabal ‘Birmingham’ would no longer exist were it not for Woodlanders. Their list of plants introduced to commerce for the first time, tops a whopping 2,000 plant taxa. While the plant introductions were incredible, the catalog descriptions were, at best, sparse. Before the Internet, and even in its early years, finding out anything about plants in their lists were nearly impossible, and there was no effort to include potential hardiness zones outside of the deep south.

After the death of Julia Macintosh in 2013, and Robert in 2016, the financial debt of the nursery continued to mount, with survival looking more and more precarious each year. The nursery had been for sale for over a decade, with prospective buyers all running away after a glance at the balance sheet. One financial advisor told his client that they would be far better off financially, by opening a passbook savings account. Woodlanders had even set a nursery closing date of Fall 2022, which is why we conducted a plant rescue trip in spring of that year. Closure seemed certain, before for an angel arrived.

That angel’s name is Atlanta native, Fiona von Grey, a former member of the pop band, Von Grey. Fiona had retired from the music industry, and moved into corporate financial systems, when she found out about Woodlanders, and its rich horticultural history. After purchasing the nursery, her team had only three weeks to move the nursery to a new property a few blocks away, since the original property had been sold, The move was complicated when winds from Hurricane Helene destroyed the main office and former historic home on the original nursery property.

Since then, Fiona has invested considerable resources into rebuilding the nursery, updating the website, and hiring new staff. Pictured below at JLBG, in front of their amazing introduction, Forestiera ‘Woodlander’s Weeping’, are (left to right) Meghan Christine, a recent NC State graduate, Fiona von Grey, George Mitchell (propagator), and Jonas Meyer, a recent graduate from UGA . The key to a successful transition was retaining the services of long-time propagator, George Mitchell, who is a true genuis when it comes to propagating hard-to-propagate plants. Although Bob McCartney, now in his late 80s, is no longer an official part of the team, he still makes regular appearances at the nursery when his health allows. Fiona has also revised many of the older policies that made purchasing difficult, so you’ll now find a new a much more friendly Woodlanders. Please join me in supporting their effort and wishing them all the best!