Entertainment - Home & Garden

POSTED: Sunday, Aug. 10, 2008

Everson Garden Club spearheads pergola project

It all started with a potluck two years ago.

That’s when members of the Everson Garden Club decided that the town’s Riverside Park could use a facelift.

“There was never any focal point,” says club president Cori Litorja, “just this flat expanse and nothing to draw you in.”

So the club members started brainstorming, and the pergola project began. The park’s main attraction right now is the sports field, but the 39-year-old Litorja was hoping it could be more appealing for other activities as well.

“It’s a well-maintained park; it just wasn’t as functional as it could be,” she says. “It needs to be a multi-use place, where you can also sit and enjoy the atmosphere.”

The pergola will serve as another entry to the park. It will have three open rooms framed in timber, with a copper roof over the center space and a complementary copper-hued cement floor. Litorja says people already have been asking if they can use the spot for weddings and special occasions, which is exactly what she was hoping for.

“We want this to be a community thing,” she says. “It’s not just the garden club.”

The club received donated work from local business to create the pergola design, for the cement flooring and for the construction. They also received funding from the Everson Lions Club, the Whatcom County Parks and Recreation Foundation and individuals. The total cost of materials for the project is about $25,000, and though the club has used its funds and donations to cover much of the cost, members are still soliciting donations to pay for materials.

Though the garden club usually uses its funds to do local beautification projects and donate books to the library, Litorja thought it was time to try something bigger, something more permanent than a planter. “People sometimes think, ‘Well, the garden club, isn’t that just about plants?’ ” she says of the construction project. “But you need to have structure for those plants to stand out. The plants are more like a frame.” Though the scale of the project has been intimidating at times, Litorja is confident that the club and the community can come together to create an amazing space.

Construction on the pergola started in June, and Litorja hopes it will be complete this fall. When the project is finished, it will be gifted to the city of Everson.

“When we started this project, we had very few members and the pergola committee consisted of three people,” she says. “Now we’re finally to the point where we can get more people involved and they can envision it. It’s finally getting there.”