Longwood Gardens is a public garden that consists of more than 1,100 acres (445 hectares; 4.45 km2) of gardens, woodlands, and meadows in the Brandywine Creek Valley in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, United States. It is one of the premier horticultural display gardens in the United States and is open to visitors year-round to enjoy native and exotic plants and horticulture (both indoor and outdoor), events and performances, seasonal and themed attractions, as well as educational lectures, courses, and workshops.
History
Longwood Gardens has a long, varied history. For thousands of years, the native Lenni Lenape tribe fished its streams, hunted its forests, and planted its fields. Evidence of the tribe's existence is found in quartz spear points that have been discovered on and around the property and can be found on display in the Peirce-du Pont House on the Longwood Gardens property.Randall, Colvin (2005). 100 Years of Garden Splendor. Longwood Gardens. p. 13.
In 1700, a Quaker farmer named George Peirce purchased of this English-claimed land from William Penn's commissioners. George's son Joshua cleared and farmed the land and in 1730 he built the brick farmhouse that, enlarged, still stands today.Randall, Colvin, p. 13. In 1798, Joshua's twin grandsons Samuel and Joshua, who had inherited the farm, actively pursued an interest in natural history and began planting an arboretum that eventually covered . The collection included specimens that they collected from the wild as well as plants acquired from some of the region's leading botanists.Randall, Colvin, p. 14.
By 1850, the arboretum boasted one of the finest collections of trees in the nation and had become a place for the locals to gather outdoors—a new concept that was sweeping America at the time. Community picnics and socials were held at Peirce's Park in the mid to late 19th century. The Pennsylvania guide noted in 1940 that "Longwood received its present name from 'Long Woods,' as the section was known before the Civil War, when black slaves fleeing from the South found shelter in this station on the Underground Railroad,which was supported by Quakers of Kennett Square, Hamorton, and Wilmington, Delaware."
In the early 20th century, the family's heirs lost interest in the property and allowed the arboretum to deteriorate. The farm passed out of the family through several hands in quick succession, and a lumber mill operator was about to cut down the trees for timber in early 1906.Randall, Colvin, p. 16. This threat moved Pierre S. du Pont, American entrepreneur, businessman, philanthropist, and member of the du Pont family, to take action. On July 20, 1906, 36-year-old du Pont purchased the farm primarily to preserve the trees, in a transaction managed by Isabel Darlington, Chester County's first female lawyer. He was not planning to create Longwood Gardens, but within a few years, his desire to make it a place where he could entertain his friends transformed a simple country farm into one of the country's leading horticultural display gardens.
Pierre du Pont opened the garden to the public in 1921 and in 1937 created the Longwood Foundation, which came under the control of trustees in 1946. When he died in 1954, he "had in place a well-funded yet adaptable mechanism for Longwood to continue." The garden was free, relying solely on its sizable endowment, until 1973, when it began charging admission.
In 2018, Longwood Gardens acquired the historic Longwood Cemetery from its volunteer-run management association. Chartered in 1855, Longwood Cemetery is located just outside of the main Gardens entrance, on Greenwood Road. It lies in front of the historic Longwood Progressive Friends Meeting House, founded by Quaker dissidents in 1854 and acquired by Pierre S. du Pont after it closed in 1940. Bayard Taylor, Eusebius Barnard, and Isaac Mendenhall are among the interments there.
In 2024 Longwood Gardens acquired Granogue, a cultural landscape in Wilmington, Delaware and one of the last remaining unprotected pieces of open space in the Brandywine River corridor.
Current use Today the Longwood Gardens consists of varied outdoor gardens, ranging from formal to naturalistic in their landscape design. There are of Conservatory gardens under glass, with 13 indoor gardens and 859 different types of permanent plants, as well as fountains. The Gardens also have extensive educational programs including a tuition-free two-year school of professional horticulture, a fellows program, and extensive internships. It hosts hundreds of horticultural and performing arts events each year, from flower shows, gardening demonstrations, courses, and children's programs to concerts, organ and carillon recitals, musical theatre, fountain shows, and fireworks displays. It also hosts an extensive Christmas light display during the holiday season. During the fall foliage and Christmas seasons, the garden features an operating garden railway.
The Gardens have attracted more than one million visitors a year since 2012. Plans for growth and expansion for the next four decades began in 2010 with the hiring of West 8, a Dutch landscape architecture and urban planning firm with headquarters in Rotterdam and an office in New York City. The founder of West 8, Adriaan Geuze, stated their mission is: "to celebrate Longwood, enjoy it, keep it, preserve it, while asking how it could function as a spectacular place for larger groups of people in the 21st century." The comprehensive Longwood plan is now complete and the first major project in the plan, the revitalization of the Main Fountain Garden, began in 2014 and completed in 2017.Smith, Virginia. "Longwood to plan for 40 years. The gardens will work with Dutch designers on ways to "expand the Longwood experience for visitors." Philly Inquirer.
Grounds and fountains
The development of Longwood as a public garden began in the 1800s with the Peirce family's arboretum. Joshua and Samuel Peirce collected many native and exotic trees, which they planted in straight rows on land east of their farmhouse. Peirce also added a historical marker for Hannah Freeman, purportedly the last surviving member of the Lenape people, who had been born in the area in 1731. This area became known as Peirce's Park toward the end of the 19th century. Visitors to Longwood Gardens today still enjoy Peirce's Park, which is now punctuated by the Sylvan Fountain, added by Pierre S. du Pont in 1925–27.
After Pierre S. du Pont purchased the property in 1906, he began developing the outdoor gardens further, adding the 600-foot long Flower Garden Walk in 1907. The Flower Garden Walk features a pool known as the Round Fountain at the intersection of the main paths. Its simple jet of water was Longwood's first fountain.Randall, Colvin, p. 27–28.
In 1914, Pierre S. du Pont added the Open Air Theatre after visits to the Villa Gori in Siena, Italy, provided inspiration.Randall, Colvin, p. 31.
From 1925 to 1927, du Pont designed and constructed the Italian Water Garden on a site northeast of Longwood's Large Lake, after gaining inspiration from a visit to the Villa Gamberaia, near Florence, Italy.Randall, Colvin, p. 48.
In 1928, du Pont began adding fountains to a garden he had begun developing in 1921. This space, directly south of the Conservatory, would become du Pont's most ambitious project—the Main Fountain Garden. The Main Fountain Garden "combines Italianate ornamentation and French grandeur with World's Fair showmanship. Like other great fountains, it is an engineering tour de force using the latest technology of the time." The Main Fountain Garden debuted to the public in 1931 and was the last major project in the gardens during du Pont's life.Randall, Colvin, p. 63.
In 1957, the Waterlily Display opened under the direction of Russell Seibert, who was Longwood's first director after Pierre du Pont's death in 1954.Randall, Colvin, p. 75.
In the 1970s, landscape architect Thomas Church was engaged to advise Longwood on long-range planning, garden improvement, and visitor circulation. He contributed to many spaces throughout the Gardens, and designed the Theatre Garden (opened in 1975), the Wisteria Garden (opened in 1976), and the Peony Garden (opened in 1976).Randall, Colvin, p. 87.
By 1977, Thomas Church could no longer visit because of his declining health, and the English designer Sir Peter Shepheard became Longwood's consulting architect. In 1987 he re-worked the original Waterlily Display layout. The re-designed garden opened in 1988.Randall, Colvin, p. 91.
In 1995, landscape architect W. Gary Smith designed Peirce's Woods as an "art form" garden that brings together the most ornamental characteristics of the eastern deciduous forest. Thousands of native plants were added, including 10,000 rescued from the North Carolina mountains prior to impending highway construction.Randall, Colvin, p. 105.
In 2014, Longwood Gardens unveiled its new Meadow Garden, an American landscape spanning that showcases native plantings. The Meadow Garden is actively propagated with herbaceous perennials and includes other interventions to manage invasive plants, control trees and shrubs, and promote wildlife. The Meadow Garden was designed by Jonathan Alderson of Jonathan Alderson Landscape Architects of Wayne, Pennsylvania. The historic Webb Farmhouse, which has stood on the property since the early 1700s, has been restored and serves as an interpretive center. John Milner Architects of Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, led the restoration of the farmhouse.Higgins, Adrian. "At Longwood Gardens, a new meadow for the ages." The Washington Post. Retrieved January 26, 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/at-longwood-gardens-a-new-meadow-for-the-ages/2014/09/07/b5c34a72-271c-11e4-958c-268a320a60ce_story.html
In 2014, under the direction of Paul B. Redman, the gardens embarked on the largest project in its history at the time, the revitalization of its historic Main Fountain Garden. Led by architects Beyer Blinder Belle and Landscape Architects West 8, the Main Fountain Garden re-opened on May 27, 2017.Smith, Virginia. "Longwood to being restoring its most popular garden." Philly Inquirer. Retrieved January 26, 2016.
In 2021, Longwood embarked on Longwood Reimagined: A New Garden Experience, the most ambitious expansion, reimagination, and preservation of Longwood's Conservatory and surrounding landscape in a century. With the November 2024 opening of Longwood Reimagined, new features include the 32,000-square-foot West Conservatory, featuring interior Mediterranean-inspired gardens set amid pools, canals, and fountains; the preservation and relocation of the Cascade Garden—the only design in North America by Roberto Burle Marx—in its own 3,800-square-foot custom glasshouse; a new outdoor Bonsai Courtyard; refreshed Waterlily Court; new 1906 restaurant and The Fountain Room event space overlooking the Main Fountain Garden; new central hub with studios, a library, and staff offices called The Grove; and a preserved and expanded Orchid House.
Outdoor gardens and garden features include: Birdhouse Treehouse, Canopy Cathedral Treehouse, Chimes Tower and Waterfall, Cow Lot, East Conservatory Plaza, Flower Garden Drive, Flower Garden Walk, Forest Walk, Hillside Garden, Idea Garden, Italian Water Garden, Large and Small Lake, Lookout Loft Treehouse, Natural Areas, Main Fountain Garden, Meadow Garden, Ornamental Kitchen Garden, Oak and Conifer Knoll, Peirce's Park, Peirce's Woods, Peony Garden, Rose Arbor, Rose Garden, Student Exhibition Garden, Theatre Garden, Topiary Garden, Waterlily Display, and Wisteria Gardens.