Naples is a city of grand, meticulously designed estates, but few feel as rare as the one behind Selma Nettles’ 1958 home. Hidden from view, shaped over years, it unfolds like a quiet revelation—neat hedges forming alfresco rooms, sculptures placed with a gallerist’s eye.
For those who know her, the space is regarded with awe—a private retreat, where verdant pathways reflect the life she built after leaving behind a different one. Beyond these garden walls, Selma’s presence is well known. She’s a longtime supporter of Naples Botanical Garden, a champion for The Shelter for Abused Women & Children and an active presence in Women Lifting Women. But here, in this space, the markers of her life take a different form.
In a city where landscapes often serve as status symbols, Selma’s garden tells a deeper story—one of reinvention and independence, resilience and rebirth, where she reflects on her nearly two-decade tenure as a Southwest Florida steward. Beginning as an undefined vision, a project she took on simply because she could after the end of a 20-year marriage, the garden has grown into a living reflection of how she has shaped, and continues to shape, her own story.
Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden hedges
The sculpted greenery framing Selma’s path reflects her study of classical landscape design. The post-divorce project has grown into a personal sanctuary, representing her independence. “I didn’t have to ask anybody’s [opinion], and that was very freeing for me,” she says.
For much of her life, Selma prioritized her household and curated spaces with others in mind. She collected art that suited shared tastes and maintained multiple homes so her children always had an anchor nearby. That changed when her second divorce prompted a departure from Maryland to Naples two decades ago. The move felt temporary at first, but something about Naples stayed with her: the scale of it, the ease.
She loved the quirk of her modest downtown home, opting to honor what was already there instead of following the local trend of razing to build new. Though not officially historic, the house felt of the place—rooted in the town she first knew, the Old Naples of breezy porches and a lingering sense of its fishing-town past. Within a year, the seasonal, 3,400-square-foot retreat became home, and with it came the freedom to shape beauty on her own terms—one path, one sculpture, one bloom at a time. “I didn’t have to ask anybody’s [opinion], and that was very freeing for me,” she says.
Her relationship with gardens, like the space itself, evolved over time—from the child, who wrinkled her nose at the smell of her grandfather’s Missouri greenhouse, to the young mother, who started gardens as a way to connect with her children, to the woman, who pursued a passion project solely for herself.
Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden up close palms
The two-lot garden has undergone multiple transformations. After Hurricane Irma, Selma collaborated with Naples horticulturist Lawrence Perillo to reimagine the space.
Upon arriving in Naples, the setting itself seemed to invite permanence. Bright blue skies framed the horizon, a welcome change from the gray northeastern views she’d become accustomed to. Shaping the garden became an extension of her newfound independence, and Selma approached her landscape with the intensity of an artist claiming her medium, collecting magazine clippings, drafting detailed notes and traveling to renowned Italian gardens like Hadrian’s Villa outside Rome. There, she decoded the classical language of landscape design, studying symmetry, the use of stone and water features, and the delicate balance between structure and openness.
She enlisted professionals to realize her unfolding vision, but when they’d suggest elaborate structures around the pool or ornate gazebos, she’d push back, insisting on something that reflected her sensibilities rather than conventional luxury. “I had this undefined vision of something here,” Selma says.
The design evolved in phases, starting with the initial Italianate garden, completed in 2008. Over the next decade, she continuously refined the garden through experimentation and learning. She’d plant, observe, adjust and sometimes start over entirely when something didn’t work—like when trees planted too close to the pool caused problems with debris. Each decision reflected her growing confidence and deepening connection to the land.
Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden bench view
Blending Italian symmetry with English structure, the design adapts classical principles to Southwest Florida’s climate. Neat podocarpus hedges form distinct outdoor rooms, while strategic focal points create balance.
After Hurricane Irma knocked 20 trees down in 2017 (the home, surprisingly, was unscathed), she approached Lawrence Perillo of Naples’ Blue Landscape & Outdoor Solutions to rework the layout and create a more resilient landscape. By then, her travels had expanded to England, where the formal gardens of the Cotswolds and royal grounds of London inspired something more refined. Together with Lawrence, she undertook a dramatic transformation—replacing vulnerable trees with deeply rooted Sylvester palms, adding crushed shell pathways that provide drainage and echo the nearby beach. The redesign blended Italian principles of symmetry and water with English elements of structured shapes and well-placed focal points. Once again, the evolving garden signaled a change in Selma—a more profound sophistication, a comfort and self-assurance born of experience.
Since then, her 1958 house has remained largely intact. While newer, seemingly more robust Naples homes have sustained significant damage, Selma’s mid-century home has weathered the storms intact—she even slept through Hurricane Ian’s enduring gusts without water ever encroaching on the house. The garden’s strategic sandy ground cover helps absorb excess water, and the house’s position on a slight natural ridge has proven crucial during severe weather events.
Selma has worked to tailor her global inspirations to the rhythms of the Gulf. Instead of traditional boxwood, she uses heat- and humidity-tolerant podocarpus for the neat hedges to form distinct enclosures, and low-lying serissa shrubs to layer in mixed heights; spiky purple stalks of mystic spires recall English delphiniums. “You can pick up pieces of the design, and you can pick up the colors and just convert them to something that grows here,” Selma says.
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Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden sculpture by marton varo
Sculptures by Hungarian artist and Selma’s friend Márton Váró stand as personal touchstones throughout the garden. Each piece recalls people, places and moments from her ongoing journey of self-discovery.
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Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden tending to plants
It’s a fine balance—using the garden as both a curated gallery and a living, evolving work of art. She constantly adjusts for the seasons, watching how different florals respond to Florida’s climate. In the winter, pink and purple impatiens bloom across the landscape; by summer, they’re replaced with purslane, a hardy flower built for the heat, nestled among blooming star clusters.
Selma moves through the garden with a quiet familiarity. When she steps onto her patio, the world shifts. The house, its curated art collection, the structured interiors, all of it falls away as the garden unfolds before her. It’s not just lush. It’s sculpted, shaped by memory rather than blueprints. Paths wind as if they found their own way there. Sculptures stand not as decoration but as symbols of the life she has built and is still building. Every detail bears the print of a person, place or moment that’s marked her.
Several of the commanding marble sculptures are from Hungarian artist Márton Váró, a friend Selma first sought out for his adherence to classical Italian techniques. His 15-ton Carrara sculpture L’Opera—a life-sized soprano captured in mid-aria, her marble form both powerful and graceful—stands sentinel at the reflecting pool’s edge, anchoring the garden. The piece reflects Selma’s love of opera and the time she’s spent traversing Italy with friends. The surrounding hedges create a sanctuary that balances intimacy with openness—more peaceful than the expansive ocean and mountain views she’s known, yet more welcoming than solid walls. Hidden benches tuck into corners, offering quiet reflection within this deliberate refuge. Orchids with iris-like blooms cascade from trees—Selma’s private homage to her mother’s beloved irises, which won’t grow in Florida’s heat. These personal touchstones appear throughout the garden, elements meaningful only to her but which transform the space from merely beautiful to deeply personal.
Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden pool view
The pool, lined with towering hedges and anchored by Váró’s 15-ton Carrara marble sculpture L’Opera, honors Selma’s love of Italian opera while creating the garden’s dramatic centerpiece.
On quiet evenings, friends from different parts of her life come together over classical music and candlelit tables. And, though she’s selective about hosting public events, she’ll welcome the occasional intimate fundraising dinner for nonprofits like Women Lifting Women and Youth Haven, where the connections run deep. She greets each guest at the door, a welcoming gesture she found missing in her early days in Naples. “I didn’t know anybody, and they’d leave the front door unlocked, and we’d go in and ask somebody who the host is. I don’t want anybody to have to do that here,” Selma says.
Like any living ecosystem, her garden isn’t finished. It never will be. But the major redesigns have given way to subtle alterations, with seasonal adjustments and maturing vegetation. There’s a settled confidence to the garden and its creator, their journeys of becoming now more about refinement than reinvention.
Years ago, when a demolition fence went up around her property, concerned neighbors assumed she was razing the old home. When they learned she was building a garden instead, anonymous thank-you notes began appearing in her mailbox. “I didn’t think anyone would have an interest,” Selma says. “I was just doing it for myself.” Yet, the garden stands as a testament not just to one woman’s journey, but to the enduring nature of Southwest Florida itself—how it shapes us, and how we, in turn, shape it.
Photography by Christina Bankson
selma nettles naples home garden selma on bench
The garden offers peace—a sanctuary for quiet reflection and, on occasion, intimate fundraisers and dinners with friends. “My granddaughter calls this her ‘happy place,’” Selma says.