Category Timeline 2
Early 70s
Staff gardener Frank Fujii and stonemason Oswald Da Ross work with Madame Walska to create the Japanese Garden.
1966
Madame Walska begins her collection of bromeliads from Carlsbad Garden and from orchid grower, Fritz Kubisch. He completes the layout…
1958
Local artist Joseph Knowles, Sr., is hired to enhance the Gavit-era crescent-shaped pool in the Aloe Garden, adding abalone shells…
1957
Topiary animals from the Osaki Plant Zoo in Los Angeles are planted around the horticultural clock. Madame Ganna Walska establishes…
1955
The 25-foot diameter horticultural clock designed by Ralph Stevens is built and planted with succulents. Ralph Stevens retires. Madame Walska…
1953
The Cactus and Succulent Society tours Lotusland as part of their biennial convention. Madame Walska almost single-handedly oversees the conversion…
1946 – 1948
Stevens designed the iron entrance gates on Sycamore Canyon Road, the new swimming pool and shell-strewn beach, rooster grotto, plus…
1945
Theos Bernard serves Madame Walska with divorce papers and removes many valuable furnishings and books from the house on the…
1943
Always Room at the Top, Madame Walska’s memoir is published. Santa Barbara Superintendent of Parks Ralph Stevens, son of the…
1942
Ganna Walska and Theos Bernard are married in a secret ceremony in Las Vegas; a prenuptial agreement protects her property…