Villa Montalvo Arboretum
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The Villa Montalvo Arboretum is a 137-acre (550,000 m²) arboretum and botanical garden located behind the Montalvo Art Center, 15400 Montalvo Road, Saratoga, California, USA in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains west of Santa Clara Valley. It is managed by Santa Clara County Parks, open to the public free during daylight hours, and run as a non-profit organization for art, artists and local communities.
In 1912, James D. Phelan, three-term mayor of San Francisco and U. S. Senator, began construction of Villa Montalvo, an Italian Mediterranean style mansion on its 160-acre (650,000 m²) estate. Upon his death, Senator Phelan bequeathed Villa Montalvo as a public park. The arboretum is adjacent to the villa.
Near the house are formal gardens, with marble statues, fountains, verandas, wisteria-covered trellises, and lawns. Behind is the arboretum and Audubon Society bird sanctuary, with dirt paths leading out of a redwood canyon to Lookout Point at 1,200 feet (370 m). A number of forest types are represented, including chaparral, evergreen, and redwood. Trees native to the Santa Cruz Mountains include bay, California nutmeg, Douglas fir, big-leaf maple, tan oak, and coast live oak. Broom, mountain mahogany, chamise, coyote brush (Baccharis pilularis), madrone, manzanita, monkey flower, pitcher sage, poison oak, and toyon are also common.
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