Garden History and Design
Ruth Swetland Eppig
Cleveland Gardens
Cleveland has a rich history in Garden Design. The first Golden Age of estate and public gardens occurred in the late 1920s and 1930s. I intend to research that history and write about gardens of that era that are local. It is fascinating to discover who built those gardens and who designed them. I will write about some gardens we all know and others that are lesser known. I hope I will get input from you, dear members, to help me find some of your own family garden histories.
While the Garden Club of America is focusing on Frederick Law Olmsted and his influence on park design, I think it is best to start with our own Olmsted firm’s design for the Fine Arts Garden in front of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Charles Beveridge, keeper of the Olmsted archives in Washington, remarked when he came to town 15 years ago that it is quite rare to have such a pristine example of the Olmsted firm’s work still flourishing in our city. Many others have been lost to thruways. But the creation and preservation of the Fine Arts Garden has always been of foremost importance to members of our GCA clubs for more than 90 years.
When asked what image people picture when they visualize University Circle, one of the most frequent responses is “the Art Museum and the Lagoon.” The flowering trees in the spring draw so many bridal parties that sometimes there are skirmishes for sites for photographs. The view from Euclid Avenue, across the lake to the Museum is one of the best views in the City. There are many reasons why the Fine Arts Garden has become one of the most important landscapes in University Circle: It’s location, layout and thoughtful design; the beauty of its plant material; the large shimmering Lagoon and the views to the magnificent institutions that surround it.
The Olmsted design philosophies regarding the development of public gardens and parks were as follows:
Public parks should be for all people no matter their walk of life.
Parks should offer a place to provide relief, both physical and mental
Parks should provide a sense of tranquility, beauty and nature
These concepts of Frederick Law Olmsted and his firm are equally important today in our age of Covid 19 and disinvestment in parks in front line communities in our urban core. Specific Olmsted design elements that were typically employed in urban park design included:
Incorporating naturalistic groves of trees,
Creating rolling topography,
Designing walks and paths that flow through the landscape,
Setting up a series of spatial experiences and vistas,
Tying in the surrounding urban context by incorporating formal architectural elements, structures and gardens that contrast with the overall natural character of the park,
Using a wide variety of plant materials that provide seasonal interest and beauty
Olmsted Brothers incorporated all of the above-listed design elements into the design of Cleveland’s Fine Arts Garden
History
In 1882 Jeptha Wade, founder of the Western Union Telegraph and lifelong philanthropist, gave the city of Cleveland seventy-five acres of land which was to be known as Wade Park. It consisted rolling lawns, small lakes and ponds, winding carriage drives, wooded hillsides and the meandering stream known as Doan Brook. In 1892 Wade dedicated a portion of the park to be used for the sole purpose of an “art gallery”. The Cleveland Museum of Art was built on that site in 1916 and its neo-classical façade remains. The informal lake and park space to the south of the museum was to become what is now known as the Fine Arts Garden. Eleanor Squire, wife of Cleveland attorney, Andrew Squire, organized the Garden Club of Cleveland, the trustees of the CMA and the City Planner and was the catalyst in creating the Fine Arts Garden. Here is how it happened.
In the mid-1920s the prestigious landscape architectural firm of Olmsted Brothers was hired to design The Fine Arts Garden. Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of New York’s Central Park and many other major city parks throughout the country before the turn of the twentieth century, was the founder of the firm and generally known as the “father” of American Landscape Architecture. After the turn of the century, Olmsted’s son, Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., headed the firm and continued to promote the design philosophies that his father had established. As a result, the Garden Club of Cleveland, the Trustees of the Cleveland Museum of Art, and Mr. Hopkins representing the City of Cleveland approved hiring the firm.
The following speech was given by Eleanor Squire at the opening ceremony of the Fine Arts Garden:
I think that you will recognize the names of many families. Ellen Wade Chinn told me years ago of the Flower Procession she and her friends marched in on the opening day in 1928. She and other debutants were asked to carry a daisy chain.
At approximately the same time and endowment from John and Francis Sherwin (the parents-in-law of our member Clara Sherwin) created the Fine Arts Garden Commission consisting of three commissioners dedicated to the ongoing maintenance and restoration of the Fine Arts Garden. Their endowment along with other endowment grants are held by the Cleveland Museum of Art.
I would like to acknowledge Your Garden Magazine, the archives of the Cleveland Museum of Art and Behnke and Associates Master Plan for the photos and history in this article. My next article will describe the subsequent Master Plan by Knight and Stolar (Judith McMillan’s father’s firm) and then the Behnke Master Plan that I oversaw as Chairman of the Fine Arts Garden Commission.
Gardens are a performance art and only exist as long as they are actively maintained. That story will come next.