Fans of George Harrison and Selby Gardens may have already indulged in a stroll through the downtown gardens’ current Jean & Alfred Goldstein Exhibition, George Harrison: A Gardener’s Life, which opened over the weekend. More on that in a bit. First, a highlight of the events planned around the show: a luncheon talk welcoming the late Beatle’s widow, Olivia Harrison, who shared memories of and poetry dedicated to her husband.

Harrison, who died in 2001, may have been best known to the world as a songwriter and musician, but he considered himself a gardener above all, especially when it came to his estate in Oxfordshire, England, Friar Park. He purchased the 32-acre property, much in need of rehabilitation, shortly after the Beatles disbanded, and began the work of bringing it back to life.

“This garden really saved him,” said Olivia in a talk with gardener, author and historian Robin Lane Fox in Selby’s Event Center Tuesday. “He needed a place for solace and quiet. He said he gave his nervous system to the Beatles.” The restoration of Friar Park was mutual for owner and property.

Olivia recalled how, growing up in Liverpool, George often scraped ice from the inside of the family home’s windows, dressing in bed to stay warm. “He always dreamed of palm trees,” she said, and eventually came to own and care for a garden in Maui as well as his Friar Park home.

She also touched on George’s childhood in Liverpool with the comment that, “Liverpool had parks, and he went as a child. But at night they’d lock the gates and the children had to go home. George’s father told me that George said, “‘One day I’m  going to have my own park.’”

George didn’t have a master plan when he first acquired Friar Park, according to Olivia. “If he saw a tree he liked, he just planted it. It was the same way he wrote his music. No plan, but he had a vision.”

The Harrisons sometimes worked together, sometimes with friends as well as professionals, in nurturing the gardens at Friar Park. “But there came a time when I took the kitchen garden, and he did a woodland walk. I asked him, ‘How’s your garden going?’ And he said, ‘It’s not mine, it’s everyone’s. And anyway, it’s not a competition.’”

At his estate, George divided his time between his recording and writing studio work and his gardens, but he was, Olivia said, “very focused, not dealing with the modern-day distraction we all seem to be afflicted by today.” And in response to a question from Fox, she said that she never felt any envy of George’s love for his music or his gardens. “I would take second fiddle to the creative process any day,” she said. “And after George died, the garden saved me, like it did him. When I’m in the garden now, I say, ‘Thank you.’”

One more Friar Park-related story: The property changed hands a number of times from the mid-19th century, with the most prominent owner being the eccentric lawyer Sir Frank Crisp, with whom George felt an affinity. But before George purchased it, it had been most recently been used as a Catholic school, “and they prayed for someone to buy it,” according to Olivia. “Then George turned up, looking [with his long dark hair and modest attire] like a beautiful Jesus.”

Guests at the luncheon (where Olivia also sold and signed copies of her book, Came the Lightening, 20 poems written for George), had the opportunity before and after to get up close with the exhibit, both outside and inside in various displays taking after Crisp’s old-timey names (Ye Dial Garden, incorporating sundials; Ye Alpine Garden, mimicking George’s Friar Park Matterhorn; and Ye Gently Weeping Garden, where guitars hang amidst weeping plants, water sounds and music. There’s also a maze for getting lost in, lots of garden statuary and water features, and both George’s music to hear and Olivia’s poetry to read as guests pass through.

Inside Selby’s Museum of Botany and the Arts, visitors will also see old photos, records, videos of George in his garden, and other vintage traces of his “gardener’s life.” The exhibit continues through June 29. For full details, visit selby.org.