In 1797, Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge may have had an especially vivid opium dream that resulted in the production of a now-famous poem called \u201cKubla Khan.\u201d\u00a0 One memorable stanza described Kubla Khan\u2019s estate:<\/p>\n
So twice five miles of fertile ground
\nWith walls and towers were girdled round:
\nAnd there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
\nWhere blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
\nAnd here were forests ancient as the hills,
\nEnfolding sunny spots of greenery.<\/i><\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In1880, a tubercular New York robber baron and latter-day Kubla Khan named Jay Gould bought an estate in Irvington, New York and began adapting its existing gardens and structures to match his own grand vision.\u00a0 Last week I went to see the magnificent remnants of his efforts.<\/p>\n
\u201cLyndhurst\u201d is a shortened form of \u201cLyndenhurst,\u201d the name bestowed on the estate by Gould\u2019s predecessor, in honor of the linden trees originally planted on the 20-acre lawn.\u00a0 Some of those big, rounded trees, with their distinctive heart-shaped leaves, are still visible from the veranda in front of the Gothic Revival house.<\/p>\n
That structure, a masterwork of points and angles, was designed by architect Andrew Jackson Davis, often called the \u201cfather of suburbia.\u201d\u00a0 Inside it is full of vaulted ceilings and stained glass windows\u2014some by Tiffany.\u00a0 Most of the house is furnished as it was in the 1860\u2019s, with one room fitted out in the lighter, brighter style of the 1840\u2019s, when the structure was occupied by its first owner, former New York City Mayor William Paulding.<\/p>\n
As much as I appreciate the history and style of Lyndhurst\u2019s interior, it was the outdoors that drew me.\u00a0 The landscape design was influenced by a second \u201cAndrew Jackson,\u201d in this case the influential Andrew Jackson Downing, who derived his landscape ideas from the English pastoral and picturesque styles and was a friend and collaborator of architect A.J. Davis.<\/p>\n
The view from the back of the house looks out on the Hudson River.\u00a0 It is hard to compete with that, but the view from the front is of the artfully landscaped lawn.\u00a0 In keeping with the pastoral style, the green expanse melds into a unified whole, with boundaries and edges blurred by trees and shrubs.\u00a0 No single plant is supposed to stand out as an individual, though the landscape is full of deliberately placed, \u201cnatural\u201d groupings of trees.\u00a0 In a nod to the picturesque, this layout is accented by the occasional large marble wellhead or other decorative feature, presumably purchased from Europe by Gould or one of his predecessors.\u00a0 In Gould\u2019s day the lawn would most likely also have been populated by the sheep used as natural lawn mowers.<\/p>\n
I went to Lyndhurst to see the remnants of the glass house, originally built in 1865 by George Merritt, the second owner.\u00a0 Merritt commissioned the firm of Lord and Burnham to build a monumental structure modeled on the one at the Royal Botanic Garden at Kew.\u00a0 The finished building was a 365-foot long, wood-framed behemoth with an imposing central tower topped by an aviary and cupola.\u00a0 Gould did not get long to enjoy Merritt\u2019s colossus; it burned to the ground in 1881, only a year after the Wall Street buccaneer moved in.\u00a0 Gould rebuilt it, with steel framing and without its great tower.\u00a0 The finished conservatory consisted of 14 rooms, including a central palm court.\u00a0 In addition to the palms, the building was home to roses, fruit-bearing plants and trees, as well as Gould\u2019s beloved collection of over 200 orchids.\u00a0 Gould enjoyed this rebuilt space–at the time, the largest conservatory in America–for a relatively short time.\u00a0 Even the ruthless robber baron could not bribe away the tuberculosis that finally caught up with him. Gould died in 1892.<\/p>\n
His daughter, Helen Shepherd occupied Lyndhurst after her father\u2019s death, and it was during her time that a formal rose garden was installed.\u00a0 It is still there today, planted with about 500 shrubs, including hybrid teas, a smattering of older varieties and some of David Austin\u2019s English roses.\u00a0 They are lovingly cared for by the Irvington Garden Club, who, along with other local garden clubs, tend the rest of the estate\u2019s plantings.<\/p>\n
The glass house is a grand skeleton, its steel framing preserved, but the glass long gone.\u00a0 The orchid collection was sold off in the 1940\u2019s by Gould\u2019s daughter Anna, as a benefit for the wartime Red Cross.\u00a0 In 1988, the National Trust, which has owned the property since 1961, began an effort to restore the glass house, seeding the endeavor with $500,000.\u00a0 Though the remnants of the structure have been stabilized, no further restoration has been done.\u00a0 The problem is undoubtedly one of money.\u00a0 If a willing donor or donors were to come along, I am sure the glass house could shine once more.<\/p>\n
Jay Gould, by all accounts, was not a particularly \u201cgood\u201d man, consorting with the likes of Boss Tweed and creating a great deal of financial havoc on his way to amassing millions of dollars.\u00a0 However, restoring flesh to the bones of the great glass house would be less a tribute to Gould than a commitment to beauty, education and the advancement of horticulture.\u00a0 Perhaps the conservatory\u2019s time will come again.<\/p>\n
Lyndhurst is located at 635 South Broadway, Tarrytown, NY 10591.\u00a0 For directions, hours of operation and other information, go to http:\/\/lyndhurst.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In 1797, Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge may have had an especially vivid opium dream that resulted in the production of a now-famous poem called \u201cKubla Khan.\u201d\u00a0 One memorable stanza described Kubla Khan\u2019s estate: So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round: And there were gardens bright with sinuous … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,2,3,5],"tags":[1002,1001,998,994,996,995,1003,234,991,990,992,993,989,1000,999,1005,1004,997],"class_list":["post-1190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","category-winter","tag-alexander-jackson-davis","tag-alexander-jackson-dowing","tag-anna-gould","tag-conservatories","tag-george-merritt","tag-glass-houses","tag-gothic-revival","tag-historic-gardens","tag-hudson-river-estates","tag-jay-gould","tag-linden-trees","tag-lord-and-burnham","tag-lyndhurst","tag-national-trust-for-historic-preservation","tag-orchids","tag-pastoral-landscapes","tag-picturesque-landscapes","tag-william-paulding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1190"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1190\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1192,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1190\/revisions\/1192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}