Save Duke Gardens!
Monday, April 28, 2008 at 07:56amThis weekend, the ladies and I visited the indoor displays at Duke Gardens in Hillsborough, NJ. You all know I’m kind of a Doris Duke freak. I’d heard about the display gardens for years, but had never seen them. Then I read in the paper that, as part of a “new vision” for Duke Estates, they will be dismantled forever in less than a month. So we made plans to visit. It took Ms. Duke more than six years to build these gardens — Italian, Colonial, Edwardian, French, English, Chinese, Japanese and Indo-Persian designs juxtaposed near desert, tropical and semi-tropical environments.
The foundation says that the gardens no longer fit into Duke Estates’ goals for being a green organization, but I don’t think this is what Doris would have wanted. Go here to find out more and if you can, please send a letter.
Photos after the jump.
Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.
Click through to see larger versions (for some of the flowers, totally worth it!).
Michael on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Wow! It’s gorgeous. While I’m sure it’s time and labor and water and electricity and fertilizer intensive to keep that going, I can’t help also feeling that if it’s destroyed, folks will look back on it later as a terrible mistake.
freakgirl on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 1:19 pm
It’s completely labor/energy intensive to keep it going, but if their purpose for re-tooling the entire estate is to become sustainable, why not use the greenhouse as a working example? I mean, it’s not a matter of money to retrofit; the Duke Foundation has millions.
http://sites.google.com/a/save.....-Doris-do-
The Kew Gardens in England (which I recently wrote about in a How Stuff Works article) is a good model.
Rona on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Those pictures are amazing! My mom and I were just talking about the gardens when we drove past there last week, but I hadn’t heard they were getting rid of them. (Not that I read the paper or anything.)
I think I’ll try to go soon with the baby, since it looks breathtaking. It sounds like it’ll be a shame when it’s no longer here, doesn’t it?
freakgirl on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 2:22 pm
You have to make reservations (it’s free, though) to go, fyi.
http://www.dukefarms.org/page.asp?pageId=257
Rona on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Thanks for the link!
Petra RM on Wednesday, April 30, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Don’t trust the website for reservations! Call the number. 908-722-3700
I’m amazed they got 50K people a year through there with a broken booking tool and one person on the phones. Shows how popular it was… is.. WILL BE if you protest and spread the word! It’s very easy to send an email at www.savedukegardens.org