Nearly seventy years have passed since the last quarryman put down his stone hammer and headed home from Heal Black Granite Quarry, about three and a half miles west of Lincolnville Beach. No longer do stonecutters and sculptors seek out the quarry's fine-grained, green-tinged black rock for the high-end gravestones of midcoast swells.

But while the sounds of horses and drills have long ceased, the quarry still hums with activity, albeit of a gentler sort. In the quarry's now-tranquil pool, songbirds bathe, and frogs find shelter.Around the pool's perimeter, corktrees, azaleas, and junipers from China, along with native balsams, hemlocks, and pines, stand where workmen once tested their strength. Nearby, a solitary gardener tends sinuous paths banked in bearberry, mountain cranberry, and highbush blueberry. It's a rock garden with a twist, one that celebrates the past while spotlighting plants ideal for today's low-maintenance landscapes.

The transformation from abandoned quarry to artful four-acre Eden didn't happen overnight. In fact, it has taken Ken Cleaves twenty-three years to realize his vision, and he's still deeply involved, showcasing the quarry's leftover rock and editing his collection of cutting-edge plants. Now a professional gardener, Cleaves had much to master when he first laid eyes on the historic site. "I read a lot of books and consulted town records," this autodidact recalls, "and I worked in a nursery for a year." Mostly he learned by doing.

After clearing a quarter-acre at the thirty-three-acre property's highest point, where the sun would shine brightest, Cleaves constructed a small cottage and sheathed it in cedar shingles, some cut decoratively by hand. Then, with a place to call home, he set about his most important task: studying the lay of the land, which includes forest and wetland, as well as ledge. With its rolling vistas and impressive groves of birch and white pine, "flowers just didn't feel right," Cleaves recalls. He knew intuitively that the land and indigenous plants and rock would be his greatest assets. "You've got to listen to the site," he tells fellow gardeners curious to observe what, exactly, can be accomplished by one person with limited financial resources. "If you're alert, the land will tell you what belongs and what doesn't."

In most gardens, stone walls serve as frames or backdrops for plants. Here, they are works of art. Stones selected for their unusual grain or markings as well as for their shape form patterns within the walls. "It takes one hundred stones before you find the right ten," Cleaves says. His serpentine creations showcase the black granite rubble left behind when the quarrymen called it quits. (Occasionally, Maine sculptors and artisans stop by, hoping to share in the reasonably priced leftovers.) From 1903 until the 1930s, when the quarry was in operation, excavating the lustrous stone required an eye keen enough to break the rock in just the right place. "Black-granite grain is a lot less even than the grain of true granite, which has a slightly different mineral content," Cleaves explains. "The guys who worked here had a lot of patience and skill."

Working solo with stones that in some cases weigh more than a ton, Cleaves has learned to think first, lift second. "From the start I knew I had to use my head, not my muscles." Innovative tools have made it possible for Cleaves to go it alone. Essentials include a come-along (a portable, hand-operated winch and chain capable of hauling huge rocks), nurseryman's dolly (a "refrigerator cart on steroids," he calls it), pry bar, wooden planks (for rolling stone downhill), and steel rollers (recycled from a decommissioned conveyor belt in a Maine factory). None of his tools requires gas or electricity.

Typically, gardeners complete their hardscape before planting a single tree or shrub. For Cleaves, building walls and planting trees went hand in hand. "I didn't set out with any grand scheme," he recalls. "The garden just evolved." Like the environmental sculptor Andy Goldsworthy, whose work has served as inspiration, Cleaves held no preconceived notion of what he wanted to create. Native plants already at the site dictated what came next. Cedars and hemlocks were groomed before new species such as pitch pine and hedge maple were introduced. "I try to bring out the individuality in each plant," he says, calling attention to "Pfitzeriana" junipers and other introduced specimens that harmonize with native windswept pines and gnarled oaks. He shapes his trees by pruning as well as by tying weights to branches when he believes a lower profile is in order. Overall, the effect is Japanese, both serene and deliberate.

One low-cost way Cleaves ties in the garden with the landscape beyond is by transplanting balsam fir and hemlock from the wild. "It's best to move a tree when it's still small," he counsels. "Plants are more forgiving when they have an immature root system." In spring, before growth begins, he digs up the tree's root ball, allowing as much soil as possible to cling to roots. When transplanting from a shady site to one that's sunnier, he jury-rigs a sunshade from a bed sheet and stakes. "Ideally, you make the move just before a rainy day or, better yet, a chain of rainy days, when roots will settle in nicely, and sun won't be a problem."

Sited as it is at several elevations and within numerous microclimates, the all-organic garden affords an ideal testing ground for plants seldom seen in Maine gardens. "My property is technically Zone 4, but down in the marsh it's often ten degrees colder than it is up at the house." (According to the United States Department of Agriculture, plants in Zone 4 should be able to withstand temperatures twenty to thirty degrees below zero.) Plants introduced by Cleaves that have proven their worth include Apache-plume (Fallugia paradoxa), a white-flowered, deer-resistant shrub native to the southwest. Thimbleberry (Rubus odoratus, also called flowering raspberry), which keeps its cup-shaped pink blossoms all summer long, has held up well near a low-lying marsh. At a higher elevation, purplebloom maple (Acer pseudosieboldianum) is one of Cleaves' favorite hardwoods. Every autumn, this fifteen-foot Japanese maple relative flaunts dazzling foliage of garnet and salmon.

Just as plants and specimen stones (sunk well into the ground for a natural look) provide focal points throughout the garden, so do richly patinated artifacts collected over the years. A bell fashioned from a CO2 cartridge once used for making carbonated beverages and found at the dump marks a vantage point thirty feet above the quarry; supported by gnarled branches, the weathered piece pinpoints one of the best views in the garden. Elsewhere, antique window-sash weights delineate stone steps, and curtain hardware not seen since the 1930s bedecks a "necklace gate." Many treasures were unearthed right at the site: iron wedges once integral to quarry work punctuate new garden walls, while a seven-inch lifting hook discovered in the quarry's former blasting area peeks out from the junipers. These and other mementoes hark back to the early twentieth century, when 150 granite quarries operated around Maine.

Now in his early sixties, Ken Cleaves admits to slowing down a bit. "I no longer have the physical strength I had when I was young," he confesses. Still, he's up at 4 a.m. daily and hard at work until sundown. "People often ask me if the garden will ever be finished," he says. "They don't understand. I don't want to finish. This is what I love to do."

Tried & True

Searching for great-looking trees that hold their own in Maine? In the Cleaves garden, all the following have stood the test of time. (When shopping, remember that plants propagated locally will almost always prove hardier than those shipped in from away.)

Hedge maple (Acer campestre) Introduced by European colonists two centuries ago, this slow grower (about a foot a year) remains compact (to forty-five feet), making it ideal for smaller gardens. Great golden foliage in autumn.

Corktree (Phellodendron amurense) Unusual bark and an open, rounded crown set this ultra-hardy northern Chinese native apart. Can reach forty-five feet, with an equal or greater spread.

Katsuratree (Cercidiphyllum japonicum) Exceptional hardiness and great apricot-orange foliage color make this one of Ken Cleaves' favorite trees; tops out at fifty feet, with a twenty-five-foot spread.

Hankow willow (Salix matsudana) Two varieties, "Scarlet Curls", with reddish stems in winter, and the slightly hardier "Golden Curls", remain relatively small (to thirty feet). Easy to propagate — simply take a cutting and stick it in the ground.