building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici

about his numerous projects remain, but he undoubtedly ensured his services for
both the project design and supply of plants to develop the property of David
Hosack, president of the New York Horticultural Society and well‐known expert on
plants. Hosack had considerable horticultural experience. In 1801 he purchased
some land and designed the Elgin Botanical Garden in New York, devoted mainly to
American autochthonous plants. After selling his botanical garden in the state of
New York in 1810 (this was the first botanical garden in the state), in 1828 he
decided to dedicate himself to the estate he had purchased along the banks of the
Hudson. The property landscape, known in those days as Hyde Park, 243
developed together with Parmentier (the site is currently known as the Vanderbilt
Mansion Historic Site 244 , after the name of the following owner, who built a Beaux‐
Arts style house there at the end of the nineteenth century, which today is an
appreciable tourist attraction). Among the numerous mansions and country houses
built along the Hudson, the estate landscape of Hyde Park [Figures 106‐107]was
considered by Downing as “justly celebrated as one of the finest specimens of
modern style of Landscape Gardening in America” 245 .
Downing was the undisputed authority on Landscape Gardening in the first half of
the nineteenth century and the benchmark for a maestro, such as Frederick Law
Olmsted. His cultural role as father of American Landscape Gardening can be
243 See O’DONNEL, Patricia M., “Cultural Landscape Analysis: The Vanderbilt Estate at Hyde Park”,
APT Bulletin, Vol. 24, No. 3/4, Conserving Historic Landscapes (1992), pp. 25‐41;
244 A complete historic resource study developed by National Park Service documentation about
Vanderbilt Mansion Historic Site is at this link (the study is edited by Peggy Albee, Molly Berger, H.
Eliot Foulds, Nina Gray, Pamela Herrick):
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/vama/vama_hrs.pdf URL visited June 15, 2012
245 DOWNING, Andrew Jackson, A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening
Adapted to North America, New York, Saxton, Barker & Co., sixth edition, 1860, p. 29
Here the following part of the Downing’s description about Hyde Park: “Nature has, indeed done
much for this place, as the grounds are finely varied, beautiful watered by a lively stream, and the
views are inexpressibly striking from the neighbourhood of the house itself including, as they do, the
noble Hudson for sixty miles in its course, through rich valleys and bold mountains. But the efforts of
art are not 'unworthy so rare a locality ; and while the native woods, and beautifully undulating
surface, are preserved in their original state, the pleasure‐grounds, roads, walks, drives and new
plantations, have been laid out in such a judicious manner as to heighten the charms of nature. Large
and costly hot‐houses were erected by Dr. Hosack, with also entrance lodges at two points on the
estate, a fine bridge over the stream, and numerous pavilions and seats commanding extensive
prospects; in short, nothing was spared to render this a complete residence. The park, which at one
time contained some fine deer, afforded a delightful drive within itself, as the whole estate
numbered about seven hundred acres. The plans for laying out the grounds were furnished by
Parmentier, and architects from New York were employed in designing and erecting the buildings.
For a long time, this was the finest seat in America, but there are now many rivals to this claim”.
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