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Water Features
Never underestimate the power of childhood inspiration. When six-year-old Pierre S. du Pont attended the 1876 Great Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, he was mesmerized by the waterworks. This sense of wonder never left him. Water would play a key role in the development of Longwood Gardens.
The first fountain was a modest round one with a single jet, located where two paths intersect on the Flower Garden Walk. Subsequent installations became increasingly more elaborate.
Pierre du Pont combined his love of theater with his fondness for fountains and his knack for engineering in the Open Air Theatre starting in 1913. This provided a venue for outdoor performances from such notables as Philadelphia’s Savoy Company and John Philip Sousa’s band. Simple fountains were in place on the stage from the beginning, but one evening in 1927 a switch was flipped, and the annual “garden party” would never be the same. As the audience gasped, jets of water blasted up fifty feet into the trees, lit from below by more than six hundred colored lights. Pierre du Pont must have been thrilled. Today performing arts events and fountain shows in the Open Air Theatre still wow visitors.
The Main Fountain Garden in front of the Conservatory has some impressive statistics: Ten thousand gallons of water per minute circulate through 380 fountainheads, scuppers, and spouts; the highest jet soars 130 feet in the air; a 90,000-gallon underground reservoir feeds the fountains and the 50-foot waterfall; the whole system can hold 675,000 gallons. Daily fountain shows are given in summer, with evening displays several times a week.
The Villa Gamberaia near Florence, Italy, inspired du Pont to design the Italian Water Garden, a series of blue-tiled pools punctuated by carved limestone ornaments. Six hundred water jets recirculate 4,500 gallons of water each minute. Pierre du Pont added a unique feature: a staircase down which water cascades. Ever the engineer, du Pont did fifty pages worth of hydraulic calculations before the fountains opened in 1927. When his numbers were checked prior to the Italian Water Garden’s 1991-1992 renovation, everything was correct.
The Peirce-du Pont House
The Peirce family of Quaker farmers built the first part of this brick house in 1730. It was enlarged several times over the next century and a half. Pierre du Pont added a wing in 1914 and connected the two parts with a glass-enclosed courtyard.
The first floor of the house is now the Longwood Heritage Exhibit. A twelve-minute introductory video gives a good overview of Pierre du Pont’s creation of Longwood Gardens. Exhibits present a fascinating look at his life and legacy.
The Conservatory
Longwood is world famous for its Conservatory, which is divided into twenty distinct “houses” or “gardens.” No matter what time of year you visit, spectacular floral displays are always in bloom.
The centerpiece of the Conservatory is the Orangery and Exhibition Hall, which opened in 1921 after three years of construction. The original plan was to have orange trees grow and bear fruit here. When the trees failed to produce, they were replaced by the manicured lawns and flowerbeds still in place today. Arched windows add to the light that comes through the roof. At the northern end of the Exhibition Hall is the Music Room, always exquisitely decorated during the Christmas display.
The East Conservatory will reopen in late 2005 after a major facelift to create a vibrant interior landscape grounded in Spanish and French classical garden design.
Other highlights of the glass houses include the Mediterranean Garden, the Silver Garden, bonsai display, and a room full of orchids. The Estate Fruit House harks back to the era when Longwood was a country estate, until about 1954. Lemons, pomegranates, figs, melons, and other fruits lend structure and texture to the garden. Given Pierre du Pont’s penchant for precision, you may not be surprised to learn that when grapes were originally grown indoors, each vine was pruned to produce exactly twelve bunches, with a prescribed number of grapes in each bunch.
The Conservatory’s Ballroom was constructed in 1929 specifically to house the Aeolian organ designed for the site. The world’s largest residence organ, it has 10,010 pipes that produce almost every sound imaginable.
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Reading List:
Thompson, George E., Sr. A Man and His Garden: The Story of Pierre S. du Pont’s Development of Longwood Gardens. Kennett Square, PA: Longwood Gardens, 1976.
Complete reading list
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