This Bolton Hill architect filled her neighborhood with flowers and exotic plants

Susan Van Buren was a finder of lost animals. A fixer of broken things. A nurturer of plants.

The longtime Bolton Hill resident and landscape architect thought that “there’s something beautiful and something redeemable in everything,” said her daughter, Adrienne Noonan. She’d pick up strays on the street and patch them up. She’d collect withering plants and nurse them back to health. She’d look in alleys for tossed furniture and scavenge thrift stores for clothes and other souvenirs.

Give her a little time, and she’d turn trash into treasure. She had a vision for everything.

She kept busy until the end. When Van Buren died April 15 of liver cancer, the 78-year-old left her family with a massive, colorful garden and a few items she hadn’t finished repurposing into something new. Her husband will keep tending to the plants, but he doesn’t know where to start with the upcycling projects. She just had a special touch.

“She loved life,” said her husband, Peter Van Buren. “She loved living things — and lots of inanimate ones, too.”

Susan Van Buren was born in Indiana on March 2, 1948, the second of Ted and Mim Hunley’s four children. Her father was a dentist in the Navy, so the family moved around often in her youth. They made stops in California, Rhode Island, North Carolina and Florida. They were twice based in Bethesda, where Susan attended high school.

She was an attentive student who genuinely enjoyed learning new things, said her daughter Adrienne. Hearing Martin Luther King Jr. speak at the March on Washington in 1963 was a highlight of her high school experience. She visited D.C. museums and started exploring interests in photography and art.

Susan and her siblings inherited their parents’ “Midwestern sensibilities” and “pioneer spirit,” Adrienne said. Susan gardened and fished with her father and learned to sew from her mother.

After high school, she headed to Middlebury College but left after a year, finding Vermont too cold and isolating. She enrolled at the George Washington University in D.C., where she studied art history, architecture and life sciences and joined progressive advocacy groups. She met her first husband, a photographer named Tommy Noonan, at a peace rally.

“She really embraced change and a nonconformist attitude,” said her younger daughter, Melissa Noonan.

The couple welcomed Adrienne and Melissa in the early 1970s and settled in the D.C. area. Susan taught at a Montessori school and helped run a children’s nature camp.

“We had all kinds of arts and crafts and lots of collections of toys, but it was always learning — it was like learning as fun,” Melissa said.

At their home in rural Loudoun County, Virginia, the family cared for a menagerie of animals — cats, dogs, chickens, steers, horses, possums. Meanwhile, Susan started her career as a freelance graphic designer for ABC, where she met Leslie Schwing.

“She was the most balanced person that I knew,” Schwing said. “She was kind of a jack-of-all-trades and a master of a whole bunch of them.”

After a decade, Susan was eager to pivot her career. She considered medicine or art conservation but decided on landscape architecture. Susan and Tommy divorced, and in 1981, she and the girls moved to Massachusetts to earn a master’s degree from the Conway School of Landscape Design.

She sat next to Peter on the first day of class. During group introductions, he started ranting about the pitfalls of marriage. She went next, talked about her recent separation, then turned to her neighbor and said, “I still believe in marriage.”

It was maybe a week before they were official. She was five years his senior and had more graphic design experience, and Peter thought she was among the smartest women who’d ever lived. After graduating in 1982, the couple moved to Connecticut for a few years, where Peter sold wine and Susan found landscape architecture work.

But Connecticut was never meant to be a permanent home. The couple started looking for their next stop in Virginia and passed through Baltimore to visit Schwing on the way back north. They drove through the Bolton Hill neighborhood, captivated by streets filled with rowhomes and trees.

They moved in 1988, and Susan — always environmentally conscious — started directing land stewardship at the Accokeek Foundation, which supports the preservation of Piscataway Park. She was a member of the state’s Sustainable Growth Commission and led the Cylburn Arboretum Association. She and Peter joined the green energy group TerraLogos, which they led for years until retiring in 2013.

“What they were doing was really cutting edge,” said Becky Arnold, a former TerraLogos colleague. “They were very involved in Maryland, and even beyond, trying to push forward sustainability, energy efficiency, and really making that happen.”

In 2020, they were on the hunt for a new home in Bolton Hill. Over the years, they’d been eyeing a house with a gorgeous garden space. They were about to close on another home when the dream house suddenly went up for sale. They decided to buy it, sight unseen.

Susan filled the yard with wildflowers and exotic plants, designing the layout so there was never a bad view.

“Everywhere you go, there’s something unique blooming at every time of the year,” Schwing said.

Susan loved everything about Bolton Hill — the history, the people, the sense of community. Some of the best days in the neighborhood were when her grandkids came to visit. She’d take them to the local pool, then come back home to eat popcorn while they watched true crime shows and “30 Rock.”

She was heavily involved in local clubs and events and was a strong advocate for preserving the architectural history of the neighborhood. At her new house, she planted a side garden bordering Bolton Hill Nursery School so she could chat with the kids.

She believed in the power of good design in public spaces and “making places feel welcoming,” said Lauren Schiszik, now the director of Baltimore’s Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation. Susan was “so generous with her time, with her knowledge” when they worked together, Schiszik said.

“She just did a whole lot to care for the neighborhood and its sense of place,” she said.

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