This has been a beautiful and very busy spring. We’ve been lucky to have thousands of visitors to the garden and, despite recent landscape renovation, the weather and plants conspired to create a beautiful scene for our guests to enjoy. Even with all of this beauty though, there are some things that don’t look their best or don’t come off well. Sometimes these shortcomings make their way into a “Tell the Director” note. I usually cringe a bit when I open the inter-office envelope of notes. Inevitably, I find myself agreeing with something a guest said: yes, we need more handicap parking; yes, we ought to offer a map guide to the wider estate; and yes, it is easy to get lost in the garden.
Recently though, I received a long note that concluded this way:
“The Sundial Garden, a gorgeous spot, is in my opinion marred notably by the plastic benches. They look in a word, absurd.”
I was puzzled. I tried to remember whether we had any plastic benches at all at Winterthur and I ran through a mental inventory of the benches in the Sundial Garden. I walked up to the Sundial Garden and realized that maybe she was referring to the green, wooden benches currently placed in the garden. Take a quick glance at these benches and you might mistake them for molded plastic patio furniture. I guess the curves and green color could make you think that they are synthetic.
The comment made me reflect on one of the dilemmas inherent in managing a historic garden. Our cultural reference points are constantly shifting while, in theory, the historic garden remains the same. Our job in managing the garden is to remain true to the design intent of HF du Pont and this, at times, puts us at odds with today’s tastes. Our responsibility is clear though, the garden ornament, plants, paving, and furniture in the garden ought to reflect the design ideas of Mr. du Pont.
To the average visitor, for example, our use of asphalt for paths might seem no better than the common use of asphalt for scores of local driveways and acres of parking lots. For Mr. du Pont though, in 1915, asphalt was a thoroughly modern material that signaled his innovation, wealth, and sound management. We chose to duplicate his use of asphalt and went so far as to match the color and texture he originally used throughout the garden.
One of my favorite dilemmas created by this principle is in the use of plants that might be considered out of fashion. Mockorange, deutzia, kolkwitzia, pearlbush, spiraea, quince, and weigela are all plants that would be more at home in a garden of the 30′s than in today’s multi-season conscious garden. I love that we grow these plants and that visitors get to enjoy their ephemeral beauty. For me the sight of a mockorange and the fragrance of a lilac instantly transport me back to my grandmother’s garden. That is part of the magic of a historic garden.
Occasionally the steps we take in preserving the garden are going to seem absurd. I think it is important though that we make sure that the gravitational pull of current fashion not draw us off the path of preservation. We shouldn’t just just hold on to the unique qualities of this garden – we need to celebrate them so that they remain as strong in the design today as they were in 1969.
