"When the Canadian-born, New York-based tech entrepreneur Stewart Butterfield left Salesforce, which in 2021 had acquired Slack, the revolutionary workplace-messaging platform that he cofounded, his farewell email teased a new hobby. "Can I tell you something?" he wrote. "I fantasize about gardening." "Everyone thought he was joking-but here we are!" says Jen Rubio, Butterfield's wife, and a cofounder of Away, the sleek direct-to-consumer luggage brand."
"Less than five years later, the couple's expansive Southampton gardens now include vegetables, herbs, berries, and allées of fruit trees, not to mention 1,000 shrubs and more than 5,000 perennials. "Stewart brings in ripe vegetables every day, and we plan our meals around whatever he's pulled. He pickles things and sends jars to friends! The garden is really Stewart's happy place. It grounds him, quite literally.""
"When Butterfield and Rubio first visited, the interiors had been stripped and the gardens reduced to flat lawn. It was all "a blank canvas," says Rubio, "so someone could come in and make it their own." Continuing, she notes, "I loved the proportions, the history, the bones," citing especially its "eyebrow windows"-one of Atterbury's Hamptons trademarks-and a pair of "incredible" century-old trees that help anchor the property."
Stewart Butterfield left Salesforce and revealed a new hobby: gardening. Jen Rubio and Butterfield developed expansive Southampton gardens containing vegetables, herbs, berries, allées of fruit trees, 1,000 shrubs and more than 5,000 perennials. Stewart harvests ripe vegetables daily, pickles produce and shares jars with friends. The couple purchased the summer home in 2022; the house, designed by Grosvenor Atterbury, was built in the 1910s and features swell belly bricks. Initial interiors had been stripped and lawns reduced to flat expanse. Renovations proceeded in three-year phases, with construction from September to May and pauses during summers to live in the house.
Read at Architectural Digest
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