Like all great things, the upcoming feature on artists Carlton and Joan Plummer began with an idea. And, in this case, an idea contained in a letter.

Barbara Freeman, a long-time employee of Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens in Boothbay (CMBG), wrote to Vice President Susan Grisanti of Maine Home + Design Magazine to suggest the Plummer's home and more than 25 gardens as subjects of a feature. Freeman was familiar with the property as it had been part of the CMBG's annual garden tour.

Grisanti visited the artistic couple at their East Boothbay home, had lunch, heard their story and walked the property. After seeing the gardens, panoramic view of the Damariscotta River and the house last July, she decided the magazine would do a story, and said she would send a photographer out.

Some of those photos provide the visual layer of the Plummer feature, “Garden By the Sea — A decades long love story featuring two painters and a dream landscape,” written by freelancer Debra Sparks, will be on newsstands March 23.

The feature will describe the process — clearing the land, except for trees and shrubs designated by Joan to remain. Roadways had to be constructed by bulldozer, stone walls built, fieldstone walls to hold back the gardens that would be designed by Joan, and for terracing.

“This was a dying forest on a very steep craggy hill,” Carlton said.

Joan recalled the day they made the decision to buy the property in 1981. They walked down the rickety path down over the ledges. Carlton took her arm and they sat on the ledge along the water.

“I looked to the right and I looked to the left, and I looked across. And I said, 'Carlton, this place belongs to you. You love the ocean, you love the rocks. Put a bid on this place’.”

The bid was accepted. And the rest is architectural and horticultural history.

“It was important to relate walls and gardens to the existing terrain, what we did is blend into nature,” Carlton said. “Blending ledge into man-made walls that are mostly curved, overlapping and meandering throughout the landscape.”

Carlton designed the home, incorporating the existing four-room cottage on the property into his drawings. Addition by addition, year by year, the home grew to five levels, 14 additional rooms. The couple moved in on a part-time basis in 1982.

The 25-plus gardens were planted beginning in 1985. Joan planted roses (in memory of her mother and childhood. Rhododendrons, azaleas, lily-of-the-valley (brought from Chelmsford), hydrangea, fruit trees, peonies, autumn sedum, monkshood, astilbe, lilies, raspberry and blueberry gardens, and an organic vegetable garden. Sculptures by son Gerry, add another level of interest and texture. Sons Kevin, Bruce and Barry have all had a hand in the making of the Plummer family gardens.

The Maine Home + Design feature will encompass the couple's story as art students, sweethearts, professional illustrators, married partners, parents, world travelers, and artists, always artists.

“It's all part of the picture, I still don't know how we did it all,” Carlton said.