IN GOOD HANDS

For novice gardeners, Mike and Cathy Wagner, nurturing Musk Farm has been an act of hope and courage – with beautiful results.

- Elizabeth Wilson

No one was more surprised than Cathy and Mike Wagner when they purchased Musk Farm, a quaint 1870s former schoolhouse with expansive gardens near Daylesford in Victoria. They hadn’t been yearning for a life in the country, nor were they experienced gardeners. They’d merely intended to have a stickybeak at the property when they heard it was for sale. But nine days later, they signed on the dotted line.

The purchase, in February 2017, was the culmination of a huge year for this semi-retired Melbourne couple. Just six weeks earlier, after years of deteriorating health, Mike had undergone a life-saving kidney transplant, with Cathy donating the kidney. Buoyed by Mike’s recovery and with a renewed sense of hope and optimism, they visited Musk Farm with its storybook home and 1.4 hectares of otherworldy gardens.

“It was a rash decision,” says Cathy of the purchase. “But having gone through the surgery, and survived it, we walked into Musk Farm and thought ‘we could live here and just stop and breathe’. We saw it as a life-affirming decision.”

Many Melburnians are familiar with Musk Farm. It’s the property once owned by the late interior designer Stuart Rattle, who famously restored the old schoolhouse and developed the English style gardens as a series of manicured outdoor rooms that he opened to the public. After Rattle’s death in 2013, the property was owned by Ray Williams, a confident plantsman who put his own stamp on the garden including the addition of many new plantings and the installation of a clock tower.