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VIEW 2009 Now Online

The 2009 issue of VIEW, the annual LALH magazine, has rolled off the presses. Published each summer, VIEW features articles about new and forthcoming LALH books and profiles the preservation successes that LALH books inspire.

A few highlights from this year’s issue:
- Dean Cardasis, director of the James Rose Center, reflects on Rose’s melding of indoor and outdoor space.
- Pennsylvania State University professor Michael Barton reveals how Warren Manning’s park system transformed Harrisburg.
- Jane Roy Brown, LALH director of educational outreach, explores the ideas behind an Olmsted Brothers mental hospital campus in Sedro-Woolley, Washington.

LALH supporters receive VIEW free of charge. Subscriptions are also available for $15 annually. Click here to subscribe online, or order by phone (413) 549-4860, or by sending a check to:

LALH
P.O. Box 1323
Amherst, MA, 01004-1323

To download a pdf for the current or past issues, click here. 

LALH Launches Two New Book Series

Designing the American Park

From Central Park to Yosemite Valley, park landscapes are among the most significant achievements of American art and society. The historical events and themes that motivated their creation—the reform of the city, the roots of environmentalism, the changing meaning of nature in American art—give park history a broad appeal. Park design shaped cities such as Buffalo, Minneapolis, and Chicago, where these historic landscapes remain beloved legacies and amenities. State and national park systems preserve some of the nation’s most scenic and historic landscapes, and the history of their creation often intersects with the story of municipal park creation, as at Niagara Falls and Minnehaha Falls. But if parks are often touted as “America’s best idea,” there has been no series of scholarly publications devoted specifically to the history of their design.

A new LALH book series—Designing the American Park—aims to attract a generation of contributors who are ready to forge a mature vision of this unique chapter in American cultural history. Individual titles, still under development, will explore the role of design in physically realizing the aspirations of park advocates.  
Series editor Ethan Carr, FASLA, is a landscape historian and an associate professor at the University of Virginia School of Architecture. He is the author, most recently, of Mission 66: Modernism and the National Park Dilemma. Please direct inquiries to Carr at ec2h@virginia.edu.

Studies in the History of Environmental Design

This second new series examines the conversion of land for various human uses while respecting the inherent richness and diversity of place and nature. From the late eighteenth century forward, the men and women who designed American landscapes were engaged with emerging philosophies and cultural debates over the appropriate relationship of humans to nature. Debates over the real meaning of progress shaped the development and design of western railroad towns. New ideas about conservation led to new understandings of place and the protection of vast landscapes for the benefit of future generations. And the emergence of a science of ecology spurred a greater emphasis on natural design.

Possible subjects for individual books in the new series will include places, designers or other historical figures important to the history of environmental design, and/or significant themes or movements. While the focus will be on the United States, international linkages and the transference of transatlantic ideas will be also considered. Because of the absolute necessity of sustainable living in the future, this series is also timely. Books in the series will foster an interdisciplinary dialogue about the human/nature relationship, influencing the decisions we make and the places we design today.

Edited by Daniel J. Nadenicek, dean of the College of Environment and Design at the University of Georgia. Nadenicek has published extensively on the history of environmental design and is author of the introduction to the ASLA Centennial Reprint of Landscape Architecture as Applied to the Wants of the West by H. W. S. Cleveland. Please direct inquiries to Nadenicek: dnadeni@uga.edu

Fire Scorches Santa Barbara Botanic Garden

On May 6 the Jesusita wildfire swept through the Santa Barbara Santa Botanic Garden, scorching sixty of the garden’s seventy-eight acres (and 8,733 acres in the surrounding area). “We lost close to nine thousand individual plants—shrubs, trees, and perennials,” reports Andrew Wyatt, the garden’s director of horticulture and facilities. He adds that a well-rehearsed evacuation plan prevented injuries to visitors and staff, and flames spared the seed bank, as well as the library and herbarium. “The garden’s focus is on native plants, and many species are adapted to fire,” Wyatt said. “Some of the burned areas will regenerate easily, but some won’t.”

The botanic garden, established in the late 1920s, contains elements designed by historically significant landscape architects including Lockwood de Forest Jr. (1846–1949) and Beatrix Farrand (1872–1959). De Forest designed Pritchett Path, now charred; but the central Meadow, on which he and Farrand (and others) collaborated, survived. The landscape exhibits most ravaged by the fire include the oak woodland, the Porter Path, most of the pine and Cupressus collections, and the redwood tree-ring exhibit.

Other losses included all the vehicles and tools (save for a single shovel), the historic Gane House and Campbell Bridge, the Home Demonstration Garden deck, all propagation lath houses, and the director’s residence.

By May 18, the Meadow and other intact portions of the garden—the Discovery Garden, teahouse, desert, and most of the redwood exhibits—reopened to the public. In hopes of restoring the damaged areas by next summer, the staff is working to stabilize, rebuild, and replant. “In a way,” Wyatt says, “we consider ourselves lucky. It’s quite an educational opportunity to show visitors how some species adapt to fire, and a chance to replant some parts of the landscape with natives in consideration of future fires.”

For updates, visit www.SantaBarbaraBotanicGarden.org

Bankruptcy Threatens Another de Forest Design

“VERY LARGE MAGICAL ESTATE IN THE HEART OF MONTECITO. 17.4 ACRES, A YEAR-ROUND CREEK, POOL, LOVELY POND, REFLECTING POOLS, FOUNTAINS, ARTISTIC REST AREAS AND ART WORK ADORN THE GROUNDS. RECENTLY APPRAISED AT $30,000,000. THE OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME!”

This description of 2549 Sycamore Canyon Road—a.k.a. Val Verde—appeared as #09-1270 in the real estate listings for Montecito, California, this spring, following news that the estate’s owner, the nonprofit Austin Val Verde Foundation, had declared bankruptcy. Asking price: $19.5 million. One local realtor, citing a nearby 7.5-acre property that recently sold for $25.5 million, says that this state historic landmark, with its Bertram Goodhue house and Mediterranean-style gardens designed by Lockwood de Forest Jr., is “a steal” for the price.

The gardens combine modernist and Islamic architectural features with native flora to phantasmagorical effect. Kellam de Forest, son of the early twentieth-century landscape architect, views Val Verde as the strongest surviving example of his father’s work. “This was not the conventional Beaux-Arts, Italianate garden. It was very modern for its day, using the formality of a classical garden, but with modernistic features. For example, my father used the oaks that were growing on the site as sculptural forms to accentuate the cultural landscape,” says de Forest, who fears the property will be sold to a developer and subdivided.

Those fears are grounded: Victor Plana, a realtor with Coldwell Banker, says that abutters have expressed interest in buying portions of the estate to buffer their boundaries.

The best-case scenario, in de Forest’s view, is that a garden-preservation group would buy the estate and preserve it. “The next best would be that an individual buys it as a private home and maintains it intact, appreciating it as a historic site and cultural landscape,” he says.

Plana welcomes preservation-minded buyers: (c) 805-895-0591, (o) 805-565-8807; victor@victorplana.com

New Olmsted Master List Reaps Awards

In April 2008, the National Association for Olmsted Parks published an expanded edition of The Master List of Design Projects of the Olmsted Firm 1857–1979, edited by Lucy Lawliss, Caroline Loughlin, and Lauren Meier. Part of this Herculean achievement—the firm’s output numbered more than six thousand projects—involved shepherding a large group of volunteers and staff of NAOP and the Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site through two years of research, writing, and editing. Several landscape architecture firms also contributed toward the publication or provided services to defray the cost.

This spring, the mighty book reaped three major professional awards: an Honors Award from the American Society of Landscape Architects, the Award of Excellence from the Boston Society of Landscape Architects, and a 2009 J. B. Jackson Prize from The Foundation for Landscape Studies.

NAOP Executive Director Iris Gestram says The Master List ($45 for NAOP members, $55 for nonmembers) can be ordered through the NAOP website or purchased at selected booksellers, conferences, and National Park Service sites. Proceeds from book sales will recoup production expenses and fund educational activities and related publications.

Preservation at Rolling Ridge

“The spatial organization was broad and its impact powerful. This was a landscape to be walked—garden theatre at its best,” Robin Karson wrote about Fletcher Steele’s design of a lakefront summer estate in North Andover, Massachusetts, for Ethan Allen, a wealthy New York industrialist. Begun in 1915, the estate, called Rolling Ridge, displayed Steele’s ingenuity and “would boost the young landscape architect to the upper ranks of the field.”

Today, the property belongs to the Methodist Church, which operates the Rolling Ridge Retreat and Conference Center here on thirty-six acres. The center’s director, Larry Peacock, aware of the landscape’s obvious design and its steady deterioration, contacted the Landscape Institute at Arnold Arboretum, in Boston, to offer the site as a potential preservation project for students. He was seeking help in assessing the landscape’s significance before he rerouted the driveway and added a building.

Guided by Margie Coffin Brown, a landscape architect who teaches in the institute’s historic landscape preservation program, students Maggie Redfern and Maureen O’Brien used Rolling Ridge to learn how to develop a cultural landscape report—a document that describes, analyzes, and recommends preservation treatments for historic landscapes. Brown invited Karson to walk the site with the students.

“Robin provided context on Steele and illuminated some of his signature maneuvers. For instance, how he’d place a wall in a certain way to define a space,” Brown says. “She also assisted the students and the property owner in coming up with a plan to preserve the landscape. She suggested that the center form an advisory committee—an important next step.”

Karson found the students’ research impressive: “They uncovered information that was new to me, such as connections between the Allens and other Steele clients.” The students were finishing the cultural landscape report over the summer.

Southern Garden History Conference: Sept. 24-26

2009 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Conference on Restoring Southern Gardens & Landscapes. In celebration of this milestone, this year’s conference returns to its roots in addressing plants and planting of historic gardens in the South.

Sessions will include practical information on planting and maintaining the historic garden in both private and public contexts, case studies of historic landscape restorations, and resources for heirloom and historic seeds, flowers, bulbs, trees, vegetables and native plants. In honor of the anniversary year, the popular conference plant sale will be expanded and will be available throughout the conference.

Sponsored by the Southern Garden History Society, the conference will begin with afternoon guided tours of the gardens of Old Salem in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on Thursday, September 24, followed by an opening reception and keynote address by Peter Hatch, director of gardens and grounds at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.

The weekend also features a visit to Reynolda Gardens of Wake Forest University and dinner on the grounds at Reynolda House Museum of American Art. (For the story of these historic landscapes, please see Catherine Howett’s A World of Her Own Making: Katharine Smith Reynolds and the Landscape of Reynolda.) Two photographic exhibitions will be on view during the conference: “Early Views of the Salem Landscape” and “Heroes of Horticulture,” featuring culturally significant landscapes at risk.

To register, download a form or contact Sally Gant: 336-721-7361; sgant@oldsalem.org

Research Query: Rose Standish Nichols’s Townhouse Garden

For a cultural landscape report, garden historian and designer Larry Simpson is seeking information pertaining to the Rose Standish Nichols garden at 55 Mount Vernon Street, Boston. Nichols (1872–1960), a landscape architect and author, wrote three books on gardens and designed many gardens throughout the U.S. during the first half of the twentieth century.

Simpson invites anyone with photographs, plans, or stories about the garden, particularly from the period 1900–1960 to please contact him: lasimp@verizon.net

Summer Recipe from LALH: Crunchy Quinoa Salad

This simple, hearty salad harmonizes with summer’s grilled entrées and taps the season’s farm-fresh veggies—the perfect cookout companion. The main ingredient is quinoa (pronounced keen-WAH), a gluten-free grain high in protein, fiber, phosphorous, iron, and magnesium. It is also a balanced source of amino acids.

Ingredients:

2c of dried, pre-rinsed quinoa
1c each of chopped red onion, chopped cucumber, sliced radishes, chopped carrots, and any other vegetables desired
3-4 cloves of garlic, minced or smashed
1/2c chopped cilantro
1/2 tsp of salt for each cup of vegetables used
1/2c fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2c of extra virgin olive oil
pepper to taste

Directions:

Cook quinoa according to the directions on the package. Mix the oil, lemon juice, garlic, salt and pepper in a small bowl and then toss it with the cooked quinoa while it is still hot. Put the dressed quinoa in the fridge to cool, and chop the veggies. Once the quinoa is cool, mix in the veggies and garnish with cilantro. Serves 10.

Recipe by Jessica Dawson.

Department of Art & Whimsy: James Rose, Landscape Anarchist

Among the defining characteristics of landscape architect and author James Rose (1913–1991), the subject of a forthcoming LALH book, were the capacity to reuse discarded materials and a penchant for running afoul of building authorities. According to Dean Cardasis, director of the James Rose Center (Rose’s former residence) in Ridgewood, New Jersey, Rose was fond of quoting Thoreau, who said, “. . . when confronted by an absurd law, that’s the time for civil disobedience.”

Cardasis, the author of the book-in-progress, recounts one such episode of civil disobedience related to him by Rose. The incident involved a landscape “screen” that Rose built at his home. “The screen stood—in fact, still stands—at the far corner of his tiny lot, along the property line,” Cardasis says. “It was constructed from an old post-and-rail fence, no doubt recycled from a nearby site on which he was making a garden. The rails had been turned on end and placed next to each other to make an opaque, eight-foot-tall, obtuse-angled screen which, woven together with other materials and plants, defined an edge of the garden.

When Rose first built it, the local building inspector—with whom Rose had been in numerous disputes—insisted that he take it down, citing the regulation that one cannot have a fence any higher than four feet tall on a property line. To this Rose indignantly replied, ‘That is not a fence. It is a pole arrangement!’ Well, he had to go to court on this one. The judge declared, ‘That is not a pole arrangement. It’s a fence, and you have to take it down!’”

Years later, a few weeks before he died, Rose was lying in bed looking out through his floor-to-ceiling window, chatting with Cardasis. ”You know, Dean,” he reflected, “my whole life, people have said to me, ‘You can’t do it! You can’t do it!! You can’t do it!!!’” Then he paused and, lifting a shaking index finger, pointed to the still-standing pole arrangement. “Well,” he said, “There it is!”