For a guy who runs on only five hours of sleep each night, Frank Mariani is a man who is hard to keep up with. Yet, walking with him around his Lake Forest garden — a 10-acre estate that includes an ornamental kitchen garden, a hefty English perennial border, a prairie, an orchard, a woodland, an elegant allee of crabapples, and a phenomenal collection of native and exotic trees — it’s hard not to be caught up in his fervor.
“See these hellebores? In March their little heads were sticking above the snow,” he says, taking a few steps forward. “And this serviceberry . . . the robins get a little tipsy when they go after the ripe fruit. Ever see an old serviceberry? Bark striped like a tiger, old and gnarly. Beautiful in its own way.” We take a few more steps. “Look at this redbud — a good redbud makes me stop the car. And Taxodium — now there’s a tree that’s spectacular in winter . . .”
After more than three decades working in the landscape industry, Mariani’s enthusiasm in plants, gardens or the folks who create and enjoy them has not waned. Now 50, he’s nurturing Mariani Landscape, which was started by his father, Vito Mariani, in 1958 as a lawn-maintenance service. When Frank was 17, and the oldest child with five brothers and a sister, his father was diagnosed with leukemia. Vito Mariani spent the last year of his life teaching Frank about the business.
“He taught me three things: Work hard, emulate successful people and give something back.” The advice paid off.
Mariani Landscape (www.marianilandscape.com) has grown since 1973 from a staff of nine and three trucks operating out of the Mariani home into an award-winning garden design, building and maintenance firm headquartered in Lake Bluff with more than 300 employees, 100 pieces of equipment and a 450-acre tree nursery in Wisconsin.
Although he has no college or university degree, Mariani says, “I took many classes and seminars and I surround myself with people like my president who has a degree from Princeton and my brother John, a landscape architect.”
The firm installs large-scale corporate and institutional projects such as the Chicago Botanic Garden’s Evening Island, an 11,000-hour installation with thousands of trees, shrubs and perennials. It also handles high-end residential landscapes along the North Shore, tiny Chicago back yards and gardens in the western and far south suburbs.
“Frank’s put together an amazing organization,” says Doug Hoerr of Douglas Hoerr Landscape Architecture in Evanston. Hoerr is known for the lush plantings he designs for Michigan Avenue and downtown Chicago. “He attracts really talented employees who are passionate about the greening industry and he keeps them,” Hoerr adds.
Weed ’em and reap
His own garden serves as a laboratory where his staff can experiment with designs and learn techniques necessary to maintain high-end landscapes.
“I’m big on training. [The staff] can practice the art of pruning here instead of making mistakes on client projects,” he says.
Mariani bought the 1929 Tudor-style house in 1986, on his wife Sherri’s birthday. “It was like the `Addams Family’ house with trees growing right up against the building. It was in really bad shape.”
The couple did much of the renovation themselves, indoors and out. “I worked on [the grounds] for two years. We got rid of a lot of the buckthorn and other weedy plants,” Frank says.
A pleasant surprise was the discovery of landscape architect Jens Jensen’s 1934 design for the then-35-acre estate. The restored drawing hangs in Mariani’s conference room.
One of the couple’s favorite spots in the garden is the 30-by-80-foot potager, an elegant French-style kitchen garden that combines herbs, flowers and vegetables. Mariani was not always an avid vegetable garden fan, however.
“We had 3/4 of an acre when I grew up. We thought we could have a baseball field. My dad said, `Sure, if you can find a way to eat it.’ He took out the tiller, and we had the biggest darn garden in the city.”
After the family’s Sunday dinners at 1 p.m., Mariani and his siblings would work in the garden. “We’d rototil, weed and then go out to play. It was torture,” he says with a chuckle.
The produce field
Mariani and his staff redesigned the potager several years ago. He and his wife enjoy cooking, and they wanted the freshest food for Italian dishes. “If you’re making Italian sausage and don’t have Melrose peppers, you might as well throw the sausage away,” he says.
The potager kicks off in spring with lettuce, spinach, leeks, asparagus and peas. Tomatoes, peppers, zucchinis and squash come next. As soon as one crop is harvested, another is planted. The figs came from the nursery of his late grandfather, John Fiore Sr.
Marigolds, nasturtiums, onions, fennel and dill discourage pests, but other plants, such as cosmos, sunflowers, ageratum and gaillardias, attract songbirds and butterflies. More than three dozen pots filled with ornamental flowers and edibles sit on the flagstone entry to the garden. The Marianis regularly harvest basil, oregano, parsley, chives, lemon balm, mint, thyme, lavender, rosemary and sage.
Road to inspiration
Frequent garden tours provide ideas that Mariani brings back to his own garden. A trip to England one dismal March had the couple visiting all the great gardens to see what they looked like during the winter. “English-style cottage gardens are popular, but the garden has to have good bones. It has to look good when there’s nothing flowering.” A border at Sissinghurst Castle caught his eye, and the end result was a new perennial border backed by yews for winter interest alongside his house.
Designer Carrie Woleben-Meade has worked for Mariani for 14 years. “He’s always asking: `Did you try this? What about this?’ He keeps us on our toes.” The day after the firm won the first-place award for its first-time entry at the Chicago Flower & Garden Show at Navy Pier in March, Mariani sent Woleben-Meade a three-page e-mail with suggestions about how they could improve next year.
Mariani says to Woleben-Meade with a wink: “When I stop e-mailing you, writing letters and calling you, I will quit.”
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Out of the garden, into the pan
Frank Mariani shares his easy fresh-from-the-garden recipes:
Fresh grilled vegetables
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Yield: 6 servings
2 pounds assorted, trimmed: asparagus, eggplant, tomatoes, carrots, green onions, green beans, leeks and yellow, red or green bell peppers (see note)
1/3 cup olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon chopped Italian flat-leaf parsley
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
4 ounces fresh mozzarella, shredded
1. Place vegetables in large plastic food bag. Add oil, garlic, parsley, salt and peppers. Seal bag; press to coat all vegetables with marinade. Set aside 15 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, prepare grill. Cook vegetables, turning occasionally with tongs, until crisp and brown, 5 to 15 minutes, depending on size of vegetables. Sprinkle cooked vegetables with vinegar; garnish with cheese.
Note: Cut eggplant, tomatoes, carrots, leeks and bell peppers into slices. Keep beans, green onions and asparagus whole.
Nutritional information per serving:
105 calories; 64% of calories from fat; 8 g fat; 3 g saturated fat; 11 mg cholesterol; 6 g carbohydrates; 4 g protein; 105 mg sodium; 1 g fiber
Fresh black figs
Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 5 minutes
Yield: 1-2 per person
6 ripe figs, halved
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
4 ounces crumbled Gorgonzola cheese
1 teaspoon pine nuts
1. Prepare grill. Brush figs with olive oil. Grill figs, curved side down, 1 minute; use tongs to turn figs at a 45-degree angle. Cook 1 minute. Turn with tongs. Cook on hot grill 2 minutes; use tongs to turn at a 45-degree angle to create score marks.
2. Remove from grill, set on platter. Sprinkle with vinegar, cheese and nuts.
Note: Also works well with peaches, nectarines and pineapples.
Nutritional information per serving:
192 calories; 70% of calories from fat; 16 g fat; 5 g saturated fat; 17 mg cholesterol; 11 g carbohydrates; 5 g protein; 266 mg sodium; 4 g fiber
Tomato sauce with snapper
Preparation time: 30-45 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Yield: 4-6 servings
1/3 cup olive oil
2 pounds red snapper fillets
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 pound peeled, cored and chopped plum tomatoes
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon red chili pepper
1 teaspoon capers
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro or Italian flat-leaf parsley
1. Heat oil in saute pan.
2. Score snapper’s skin by running knife over it in checkerboard pattern. Sear snapper in oil on both sides, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove fish from pan, add garlic, tomatoes, salt, black pepper, red chili pepper and capers. Add white wine and place on high heat. Let boil 2 minutes.
3. Reduce heat to simmer and return fish to pan until center of fish becomes opaque. Top with cilantro or Italian parsley.
Nutritional information per serving:
268 calories; 48% of calories from fat; 14 g fat; 2 g saturated fat; 53 mg cholesterol; 4 g carbohydrates; 31 g protein; 474 mg sodium; 1 g fiber
Nutritionals by Jodie Shield
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Worth knowing
Frank Mariani shares his philosophy about gardening in the Midwest.
– Branching out. Look for clump-forming, multistemmed trees like serviceberry. When they lose their leaves they have more body, more branching than a single trunk and cast more shadows on the snow.
– Quality, not quantity. Spend the money and time on fewer but superior trees, and make sure the ground is prepared properly and the plant is sited correctly. In the long run, you will have better specimens.
– Drain it. Standing water is a bane of many trees in our area because of poorly drained clay soils. Move downspouts to run to a catch basin. Try to get as much water off the site where it would collect.
– Make bones about it. English gardens are in vogue, but the bones — elements such as fences, pathways, arbors, evergreens, statuary and other ornaments that hold up a garden year-round — are the most important part of a garden when the flowers are gone.
– Get inspired. I like to look at gardens for ideas. My favorite in the whole world is Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C.
— Nina Koziol
