“Train Lady” Opens Private Gardens, Model Railroad for Benefit

Elaine G. Silets is an internationally renowned designer and manufactures of model railroads and garden railways who is affectionally known as “The Train Lady.”

“The Train Lady” is once again opening her own private wonderland on her North Barrington gardens at Wandering Tree, on Saturday, June 29.

The gardens will be open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The cost is $10 for adults, $2 for children under 12.  Proceeds benefit the Harvey M. Silets Memorial Scholarship Fund, which provides scholarships to deserving young students in all arts disciplines to attend Interlochen Arts Camp in Interlochen, Michigan. 

Free parking and free shuttle bus service is available. No street parking is allowed. Park free at 825 Route 12 parking lot (the former Kmart at Route 12 and Whitney Road in Lake Zurich),  J.J. Twigg’s Pizza & Pub North Parking Lot (405 N Rand Rd., Lake Zurich, opposite Golfview Road) and Advocate Good Shepard Hosp. Doctors Bldg. Parking Lot(entrance on Rt. 22, east of N Kelsey)

For maps and additional information, visit TrainLady.com.

 “It is my honor and privilege to host the annual garden walk and model train display benefit which provides much needed scholarship aid to deserving and talented students who are studying all aspects of the arts at Interlochen,” said Elaine Silets. “I believe that by bringing together such gifted and diverse students from all over the globe, we are — to paraphrase Interlochen’s motto — promoting world friendship through the universal language of the arts.”

For more than 30 years, the efforts of Silets and her family have provided much needed scholarships to nearly 50 students.  These scholarship students have come to Interlochen from all across the United States and abroad, including places such as: Gurnee, Illinois; Homer, Alaska as well as St. Petersburg, Russia; Kowloon, Hong Kong; and Heredia, Costa Rica.   

Magic await kids and adults of all ages as they enter The Train Lady’s lavish private model railroad gardens.  The extraordinary “Glorée & Tryumfant Garden Railway” consists of six thousand square feet of waterfalls, streams, lakes, bridges, trestles, city and country vignettes, as well as a circus, all replete with plant material and miniature trees of every description. The Garden Railroad operates 11 separate ½—inch G—Scale model trains.

The Gardens at Wandering Tree comprise ten acres of unparalleled gardens of different disciplines, including: the “The Shabui Garden Railway,” a Japanese water and stream garden with its own little train traversing the falls; the three acre pond garden; the wild shade garden with its centerpiece Burr Oak; the pleached allée of 24 interwoven crabapple trees; an herbaceous perennial border; multiple rose gardens; a pool garden; a sunken formal vegetable potager; the pink dooryard gardens; and the special Snoopy topiary that belongs to the Train Lady’s three grandsons.

Elaine Silets also will open to the public The Harvey M. Silets Memorial O—Scale Model Railroad Museum.  She designed and built this Model Railroad Museum for her late husband, Harvey M. Silets, an internationally recognized tax attorney and litigator.  Housed in an authentic replica of the famous Rico Train Station, this private model railroad museum that recreates the greater metropolitan Chicago area includes 16 trains, two trolleys, operating truck and car roadways, an operating drive-in movie theatre, two elevated trains, two subway trains, two helixes, and 54 interactive automations.