Make Sure to Attend Pasadena Heritage’s Spring Home Tour and Lecture

Pasadena Heritage will be hosting their Spring Tour on March 31. – Courtesy photo / Facebook, @PasadenaHeritage

On Sunday, March 31, Pasadena Heritage will be hosting their Spring Home Tour and Lecture, titled Historic Homes and Gorgeous Gardens” from 9 – 4 p.m. You will be able to tour the architectural and landscape design, spanning more than 8 decades. You will be able to see the extraordinary historic homes and gorgeous gardens. Tour guests will experience noteworthy architecture and landscape design that influence each other and combine to create perfect harmony. From “curb appeal” to private interiors, visitors will enjoy places that clearly demonstrate the beauty of indoor-outdoor living blended seamlessly together.

Walking the historic paths on the grounds of the historic Old Mill, once part of Pasadena’s Busch Gardens will be a highlight of the tour and include vintage and recent images of this unique property on display. (The pre-tour Lecture will present the history of Busch Gardens, a famous public attraction.)

Other tour stops will include two elegant Victorian homes in one of Pasadena’s oldest neighborhoods and its graceful and lush formal garden setting near the Wrigley Mansion. A more informally designed 1902 Classic Box Farmhouse in the Madison Heights neighborhood, sits amidst delightful and period-appropriate gardens designed by Haynes Landscape Design twenty-five years ago and recently refreshed by the same landscape design firm.

Also included on the tour is a 1930s Spanish Revival home with gardens designed and planted by the homeowner. The property was once part of the Crank estate of the Fair Oaks Ranch. The 1882 Victorian mansion can be seen at the end of the cul-de-sac. The

Buckingham House was designed in 1960 by John L. Pugsley. The U-shaped design creates a beautiful garden courtyard that can be accessed and viewed from every room in the house.

Prior to the tour, on Thursday, March 28 at 7 p.m., Michael Logan, Busch Gardens researcher and historian, will speak about Pasadena’s historic Busch Gardens. Industrialist and co-founder of the Anheiser-Busch Corporation, Adolphus Busch, and his wife Lily, bought a winter home on Orange Grove Boulevard in 1904, and immediately began working with a prominent landscape architect to beautify their property. They installed rare and exotic plants and trees, created fanciful water features, and turned the floor of the Arroyo into a botanical wonderland. In 1905 they opened their garden to the public, and Busch Gardens became a major tourist attraction until its closing in 1938. In his presentation, Mr. Logan matches historic images to their same exact locations a century later. The lecture will take place at Maranatha High School, 169 S. St. John Ave., and free parking is available.

Advance tickets are $43 for non-members and $38 for members. On the day of the tour, tickets will be $48 for everyone. Be sure to purchase tickets to both the lecture and the tour in order to learn more about Busch Gardens and to see its most important survivor, the historic Old Mill.

Guests will drive themselves to each location where docents will provide guided tours of interior and exterior features. Homes are not ADA accessible. Some locations are extremely rustic in nature with narrow paths and steep terrain. Bees will be present in the gardens. No dogs except required by law.

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