Gardens by Trista

JEWETT - She is college educated, which is what it is, but it isn’t what makes the namesake of “Gardens by Trista” who she is most deeply.

Trista Shultes has opened a retail and landscaping nursery, just down the hill from what once was Kerns Nursery, along Scenic Highway 23C, a quarter mile or so and around the sharp curve from Route 17.

It is, more accurately, the start of an entrepreneurial roots-stretching from her successful design and landscape company in the nearby town of Gilboa (many parts of which are lost to all but memory and a dam).

But now that the transition is happening, and even before, the move seems to have been a serendipitous inevitability, something written in the winds.

Shultes, since she was knee-high to a grasshopper, was raised up in little ol’ Gilboa, in farm country, within eyesight of the little local school.

Her family has been there for generations and her grandparents were passionate gardeners in the down-valley town of Middleburgh.

Shultes says she remembers forever feeling, “a love for plants and flowers.” It is deeply what she is, following that bliss to college.

She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in “Landscape Design and Construction” at SUNY Cobleskill in 2002, shortly thereafter heading headlong into the wide-world with her feet firmly on fertile ground, 

She cut her teeth at a couple of nurseries, including Kerns Nursery, forming a mutually respectful relationship with owners Bob and Pat Kerns.

Events unexpectedly intertwined as they often do. Bob and Pat retired last autumn, presenting Shultes with an offer too tantalizing and well-timed to refuse on a piece of property a few frog hops from their old shop. 

While it was in the back of her mind to maybe someday go a different route, “I never thought it would be a reality,” Shultes says.

But over the years, starting from scratch, Gardens by Trista had blossomed into a flourishing, certified woman-owned business with ten employees.

The moment was seized. “This is my first time doing retail,” Shultes says. “I will still have a landscaping service and live in Gilboa, next door to where I grew up, but the center will be transitioned to Jewett.”

That will unfold more fully in the spring. Meanwhile, the business will continue doing what it has been doing, no matter what comes.

“We are a full service landscape company focused on providing each client with the individualized landscape or garden of their dreams,” as well as post-planting maintenance, their website states.

“Each property and client holds it's own unique essence which we use to transform the earth and its elements into their personalized landscape. 

“We strive to fulfill the needs of each and every customer. Whether it be a complete design/build for new construction or the small woodland garden you have always desired. We can make those dreams a reality.

“Our garden design and installation services include (but are not limited to) perennial gardens, native gardens, wildflower gardens, vegetable gardens, cottage gardens, formal gardens, woodland gardens, bird and butterfly gardens, water gardens and rock gardens.

“We only use organic methods in our practice, and we hope to encourage this practice by the landscapes we create.”

Gardens by Trista will be open through the end of October on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday, 10-4 p.m.

They will pause before temporarily reopening after Thanksgiving through Christmas, offering wreaths and trees. Call (607) 588.6762 or (518) 231-3876 for consultations and information.