“If you’ve never been to Rose Hill, you’re missing out.”
So I was told. By several people. Repeatedly.
So I went. It was a Wednesday.
Rose Hill greets you at the gates. Landscaped walkways welcome you and beckon you forward. Hundreds of years of hard work and talent and passion rest comfortably, as if they knew you were coming. Music and laughter chase each other through the front door of the main house. Incredible, stomach rallying smells escape kitchen windows. Rose Hill wants you to relax. Have a bite to eat. Something to drink. While the guitarist strums and sings, people pass around crab dip and hummus plates. Conversations about art and film and music pause while I pet Piper, my new canine friend, who accompanied her human to Rose Hill and keeps asking me with her eyes “are you gonna eat that?” (Piper asked, not her human.) Sometimes, at Rose Hill, it’s easy to forget you’re in Aiken. Or in South Carolina. Or in 2019.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, the age of foolishness…”
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Rose Hill began a long time ago. We were at war. There were protests and politicians promising to bring our troops home from the other side of the world. The newspaper headlines spoke of political corruption and union strikes. And hurricanes kept battering the Carolina coast. The year was 1899. The name to know: Claudia Phelps. She was six.
Miss Claudia was born in Teaneck, New Jersey. According to Google maps, that’s a twelve hour drive from Aiken. (Ten if my dad’s driving.) Miss Claudia’s father moved his family to this area and purchased a block on Barnwell Avenue. Rose Hill was built. The family moved in.
Claudia Phelps spent her life reinventing Rose Hill. The stables and several other buildings were converted into the Rose Hill Art Center. Rose Hill opened up to Aiken. This is the legacy of Claudia Phelps.
… which also includes founding the first chapter of the Girl Scouts in Aiken, which is equally notable because the GSA is an awesome organization … and because I have a weakness for thin mints.
Recalled to Life*
Rose Hill began, again, not so long ago. We were at war. Protests. Politicians with their promises about our troops overseas. Corruption and union strikes. Hurricanes battering the Carolina coast. It was, like, last year. This time around, the name to know: Ketan Patel.
Mr. Patel was born in Gujarat, India. When I put that into Google maps, it directed me to drive to the Augusta Airport to buy a ticket for a twenty-three hour flight. Ketan arrived in the area in 1999. He was thirty six. And retired. Before moving to the Augusta/Aiken area, he and his family lived in Barnwell. Three or four years ago, Ketan attended a wine tasting at Rose Hill. By August of 2018, he had the key to the front door.
The Golden Thread*
Aside from an arrival from a far away land in ’99 (1899 and 1999), Barnwell Avenue, Barnwell the town, and the deed to Rose Hill, what else do Claudia and Ketan have in common? Both are well traveled. Claudia explored the world by steam ship, and Ketan visited Ecuador, Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Italy, Turkey, Australia, Canada, and China… just this year! But to truly understand what they share, you have to meet Ketan Patel at Rose Hill.
Since acquiring the property, he’s upgraded walk and driveways, installed all new roofs, and pruned and rehabilitated what Miss Claudia began. If you ask Mr. Patel why he purchased Rose Hill, he’ll tell you, “I wanted a legacy.” And now Mr. Patel’s and Ms. Phelps’ legacies are forever connected. Two strangers from different centuries with the same love of Rose Hill and the same desire to share it with Aiken. Ketan wants the future of this estate to mirror the past: weddings and events and artists and neighbors and friends.
There are two chandeliers that Ketan shows me; one he purchased in Turkey, the other he found at the Aiken Antique Mall. It’s traditional. It’s foreign. It’s mysterious. It’s comfortable. The property itself now exists as a reflection of Aiken, and vice versa.
So trust me, if you haven’t been to Rose Hill, you’re missing out.
You should go sometime, on a Wednesday perhaps.
You’ll be welcomed.
You’ll enjoy yourself.
You’ll return.
I’ve already been back five times.
And the next time I return, as I cross the grounds Ms. Claudia planted, toward the main house Mr. Patel has restored, I will think of the last line of Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. However I’ll not be sure who is speaking as they tell me, “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.” Either way, they’re talking about Rose Hill.
* Recalled to Life and The Golden Thread are the titles of Books One and Two of A Tale of Two Cities.**
** I didn’t remember that either. But as I looked that up, I learned that Dickens was paid by the word, and so I added it, hoping that catches on again…
Matthew Wynn was born in Pennsylvania, grew up in Texas and attended college in Maine and Oregon. He has been an after-school director, a baker, a cook, and a tour-manager for his best friend’s punk rock band. The son of Alan Maclay (a proprietor of Cold Creek Nursery) and Phyllis Maclay (a noted Bella author), he is the oldest and most charming of his five siblings. Matthew is an awesome husband and is super modest. He enjoys the ironic, most things sarcastic, and at times, the sardonic. He is also a dog-person.
