She was a famous opera singer during the early 20th century. But the rave reviews that the late Ganna Walska received in her lifetime typically had nothing to do with her performances.

Perhaps that's a reason why Lotusland, her sprawling estate in Montecito that has been open to the public now for 10 years, meant so much to her. The 37-acre property has been wowing audiences ever since she purchased it in 1941.

It was, indeed, the one stage she truly owned.

There, the Poland native, who sang in New York and Paris, could express her creativity without worrying about losing her voice because of stage fright or being forced to cancel an appearance in one of Puccini's operas after a bitter ex-wife of one of her six ex-husbands bought the rights.

More than a dozen distinct gardens grace Lotusland, which was purchased as a spiritual retreat at the urging of her last husband.

Each garden is just as theatrical as the woman who helped shape most of them into the stars they are today.

Take, for example, the Japanese Garden. Enter through the torii, an architectural gateway typically found at the entrance to a Shinto shrine, and you'll find a pond filled with decades-old koi and showy lotus.

Madame, as she's called by some of the Lotusland staff, was always looking for the exotic.

"She contracted with this woman for several years to make trips into Arizona and Mexico to bring back specimen cactuses," said Virginia Hayes, curator of the living collection "(The woman) drove out there, hired local people to help her dig and package them up so she could bring them back I think she had people haul things out on mule-back to get them to her truck."

But Madame wasn't above getting her hands dirty.

"There's a picture of her in her bathing suit in the Water Garden pulling out the algae," said Ms. Hayes.

She did, after all, consider herself the head gardener.

"We know she had a particular vision that was her own because she insisted on it, even against the advice of horticulturists and landscape architects who worked for her," said Ms. Hayes.

She once planted several cactuses in front of the house when one of her landscape architects, Lockwood de Forest Jr., was serving in the military.

Lockwood was fairly dubious.

She did it anyway. When he saw the design later he was astounded and wrote her a letter congratulating her on how good it looks.

Madame was willing to defer to the experts, but sometimes it just took a while.

When she saw that a corner of the stone slab used as the foundation for the torii in the Japanese Garden jutted into the nearby driveway, she told a designer to cut it off.

"She was a right-angle sort of person," shrugged Ms. Hayes with a laugh.

But Oswald de Ros, the designer, refused the request. When he came back to work, she said, "You're right!"

Some employees, however, never returned because they found her too difficult.

"The ones who stayed gained her respect and found her very generous," said Ms. Hayes. "We have three people on staff who worked for her."

And, in a sense, they still do. There's only one word to sum up the production they-and the famed opera singer-created at Lotusland.

Bravo.

TOURS

Lotusland, this 37-acre property owned by the late opera singer Ganna Walska, is open for docent-led walking tours mid-February through mid-November. The tours, by reservation only, are 10 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. Admission is $15 for adults and children 10 and older $8 for children under 10; and free for children under 2. For reservations, call 805 969-9990.