Greenwich -- Treescapes

This 20-acre site, including 10 acres of woodlands, was originally developed in the 1920s and is focused around its 1926 Cotswold/Tudor design house. Reflecting the desire of its original owner for quiet and privacy, the original landscape architect, Robert Ludlow Fowler, Jr., covered the house with ivy and planted apple trees, dogwoods, and linden, while allowing the landscape to be dominated by white pine, Norway spruce, cedar, hemlock, juniper and yew. A subsequent owner added a greenhouse and cottage while tearing down and/or moving several other buildings. Beginning in 1975 the current owners have transformed the gardens, replacing dying American dogwoods with a mix of new trees: weeping beech, katsuras, weeping cherry, and birches, among others. Other flowering trees and shrubs have brought color with every changing season. At least eight new gardens have been created. For example, the old Secret Garden with its well, which was an abandoned rose garden, became an azalea garden with an abundant variety of plant material. A new vegetable garden, a hosta garden, a wildflower garden, a boxwood garden, an informal New England-style garden, and a white garden are some of the special spaces that have been created. The addition of all these gardens has brought new splendor to the house while maintaining the feeling of serenity and elegance that is the site's heritage.

Persons and firms associated with the garden include Delano & Aldrich (architects, 1925-26); Robert Ludlow Fowler, Jr. (landscape architect, 1926-30); Mary Jo Bridge Palmer (landscape architect, 1980); Armand Benedek (landscape architect, 1982); B. B. Stamates (landscape architect, 1988); Mary Patterson (landscape architect, 1989); Adam West (landscape architect, 1995-2000); William H. and Elizabeth Finnegan Fain (former owners, 1922-1940); and Elizabeth C. McBride (former owner, 1940-1975).