Existing comment:
The Parterre:
Parterres -- from a French term meaning "on or along the ground" -- originated in 16th-century Renaissance Italy as an ornamental garden style. The style, which defines garden space by arranging hedges, flowers, grass, water, and gravel to form a pleasing pattern, was adapted in France in the 1580s and became exceedingly popular. Parterres fell out of favor in the 18th century during a shift to more naturalistic designs.
During the Victorian era, parterres enjoyed an exuberant revival in the United States. The Sunken Garden at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia featured a parterre whose design later inspired the Smithsonian Castle's original parterre. Created for America's Bicentennial, that parterre was removed in the 1980s for the construction of the underground museum complex and rebuilt as the centerpiece of the Enid A. Haupt Garden. |