Greenman Stone: A Gardener’s Best Friend
Vern and Cameron of Greenman Stone with Garden Department Manager, Magnolia
It may be frigid, and their faces may be frozen, but adding a few friends to your frosty garden from Greenman Stone, might just melt your heart and spark excitement for the warm, dirt-filled days to come. Winter pollinators, if you will, standing guard while we await seed, sun, and stamen – reminding us of our own stamina during the dark months.
Spring will come – flooding in, with chaos and color, and it’s back to our hands and knees, spade and gloves to toil amongst the guardians of the garden. Everything back to life. The statues, too, with a little imagination. Hello, friends!
How Greenman Stone arrived at the Co-op and into your garden is another tale of dreams coming to life.
Owner Cameron Nichols’ family opened an antique store in Pike Place Market in the early ‘80s, specializing in European imported antiques. Cameron, the son in N.B. Nichols & Son, noticed customers flocked to anything garden-related; in 1988, he started his own garden statuary importing business through his manufacturing ties in England.
On Cameron’s third buying trip to England, the light bulb went on: the gentleman Cameron had been working with offered to teach him how to actually make statues – there is sand and cement in Washington, after all. Cameron decided to transition from importing to manufacturing, so he and his brother apprenticed with the same man who suggested the idea in the first place. They molded, casted, and, then, came home.
Nichols Brothers Stoneworks made its mark in Snohomish, growing into one of the largest ornamental stone companies in the country by the late ‘90s. After selling the company in 2008, Cameron started Greenman Stone in Chelan County with a slightly different business model than Stoneworks – one that rewards the artists who design the sculptures for Greenman Stone’s molds.
Nichols works closely with a handful of local artists and developed a royalty system that pays the artists to design and supply sculptures for Greenman Stone: artists retain ownership of the original sculptures, and Greenman Stone forms molds around each original work to sell the castings you see at the Co-op. This system not only allows for more rapid creation of new designs, it guarantees 10% of sales of each piece goes directly back to the artist. When Nichols started Greenman Stone in 2010 there were 15 pieces – nearly 15 years later, they’re about to introduce their 194th new design!
So, even if you have collected a few Greenman Stone pieces, you can always find a new friendly face, fungi, or feature to round out your garden gang. And we think it’s true what they say: you can never have enough friends, especially in the heart of winter.
You can learn more about Greenman Stone and its artist process at greenmanstone.com!
What Makes Greenman Great!
Designed by Northwest artists
10% of each sale goes directly to the artist
Handmade in Leavenworth
Individually antiqued using eco-friendly permanent stain
Frost-proof
No two are identical
New designs every month
Written by Nicole Noteboom for the January 2025 edition of the Natural Enquirer.