If not for someone like Kate Morrison, founder of Eastover Collection, the beauty of entryway planters might go unnoticed. Amid the hustle and bustle of daily living, when people tend to rush through doorways and speed around driveways, she’s somebody who can’t help but stop and appreciate the beauty—or potential for it—flanking entrances and exits.
Whether Morrison is at home in Concord, where she lives with her husband, driving around Charlotte, where she moved after attending Davidson College, visiting her hometown of Louisville, Ky., or flying to New York City, she sees the statement beautiful plants and their containers can make at front doors, back doors, building fronts, hotel lobbies, backyard pools and even interiors.
“It's a manageable, containable garden,” Morrison says. “And there's an element of polish and refinement that planters bring that is the best way to signify: ‘This is a special place, and we welcome you.’”
Morrison has created an entire business around that feeling, offering an elevated line of planter boxes and garden accents.
As a mom of three looking for a way to reconnect with her artistic passion, she founded the Eastover Collection in 2013. Their locally crafted pieces turn outdoor accessories into an art form and provide premium function, too. Eastover’s signature planter boxes are made from a high-grade cellular PVC material that does not require a liner and is weather, rot and insect resistant. They can be custom-made, with more than 160 varieties of size, paint color, molding and patterns.
Eastover Collection’s reach extends throughout the Southeast, as far south as Florida and west as Texas.
Eastover does both residential and commercial business. Their work is on display on the porch at the Duke Mansion, where they custom-made two nine-foot-long planters with wheels, so they can be easily moved for various events.
Morrison’s home in Concord is a beautiful representation of the finishing touches Eastover Collection artisans create.
Guests to her home are greeted by two boxwood planters flanking the front walkway, complementing the roses or camellias she loves to plant in a nearby garden. Her show-stopping backyard garden features planters with double ball topiaries. She likes to change out the bases with seasonal annuals like pansies, impatiens or coral bells, and accent them with dusty miller or trailing vines. She recently installed a spire from Eastover, adding another architectural focal point to a beautifully maintained garden.
Her outdoor space is well-manicured and lovely, and like Eastover Collection, a source of joy for her.
“This is what I love to do,” Morrison says. “I love to connect and be a part of somebody’s creative process. This is part of who I am.”