Existing comment:
Archaeological Research of the Belair Garden:
Archaeological investigations in 1994 suggested that the terraces might have been altered in the early twentieth century. The University of Maryland Anthropology Department's Historical Archaeology section investigation in 1998 focused on the terraces, falls and earthen ramps. The eighteenth-century garden level was located, but clearly the garden had been remade when the house was expanded around 1914 by the New York firm of Delano and Aldrich.
The decision left to be made was whether to attempt to replicate the eighteenth-century parterre, or to honor the turf parterres of the twentieth-century Georgian Revival garden. The greatest portion of the modern ornamental garden is no longer on the museum property, and is thus out of our reach.
Horticultural experts researched Belair's historic documents, photographs, and scholarly work on other early American gardens. This resulting scaled down garden plan accommodates the diverse history of the gardens at Belair.
The central terraces of falls remain in turf as the Woodward family kept them during the entire twentieth-century. However, the small garden bed echoes both the eighteenth-century flower gardens as well as the twentieth-century ornate boxwood garden that is no longer on the museum property, but now in the neighboring pool club's grounds. |