YELLOW SPRINGS — On June 27, Bill Kent and Gail Gyure of Yellow Springs will join nine of their neighbors in opening their properties to visitors to raise money for the Yellow Springs Community Children’s Center.
The Yellow Springs “Bloom and Bounty” garden tour, featuring large and small gardens all over Yellow Springs, is a fundraiser benefiting the center. The self-directed tour is from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, June 27.
Kent and Gyure’s five acres of property includes a large, thriving garden that the couple have cultivated on their land for five years. The garden was designed by Nadia Malarkey, also of Yellow Springs, and consists almost entirely of native plants.
Malarkey’s designs often incorporate environmentally friendly practices, according to her website. The flowers are healthy for pollinators, and maintained without any pesticides. The bee balm, lavender, cornflowers, milkweed, amsonia and native grasses attract all manner of butterflies, bees – and Brood X cicadas – to Kent and Gyure’s yard.
“We wanted to share, and be a benefit to the children’s center,” Gyure said.
Malarkey has designed three of the ten gardens on slate for the tour.
The tour is also dedicated to the memory of Diane Foubert, a former director of the center who passed away last year.
Founded in 1926, the center is one of the oldest nonprofit childcare centers in the United States. Over the course of its history, the center has served thousands of children, including some who grew up to become center directors themselves, according to event coordinator Lynn Sontag.
Tickets are $10 in advance, and $15 on the day of tour. They are available at Young’s Jersey Dairy Market Gift Shop on Route 68, as well as Rosie’s Natural Foods, Yellow Springs Hardware and Current Cuisine in Yellow Springs.