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Home , Bryant Park, Central Park, Conservatory Garden, Elizabeth Barlow Rogers, Fifth Avenue, Lynden Miller

VÉRITÉ SANS PEUR

The Alumnae Bulletin spring 2013

A Force of Nature: LYNDEN BREED MILLER ’56 FOR THREE DECADE S , P UBLIC-GARDEN DE S IGNER LY N D E N B REED M ILLER ’56 HAS BEEN BREATHING NE W LIF E I N T O U R B A N SPACE S , AND TRANSFORMING CITIES AT T H E S A M E T I M E . A FORCE of NATURE WRITER: R ICHARD BADER PHOTOGRA P HERS : H O WA R D KO R N & LY N DEN MILLER

“March is the worst season for gardens,” says Lynden Breed Miller, and because she’s a renowned public- garden designer who over a 30-plus year career has created or rescued dozens of gardens throughout all five boroughs of her beloved City, you’re inclined to believe her. But a walk through the Central at and 105th Street on a gray and chilly mid-March afternoon might make you wonder whether her assessment is overly harsh. True, the shrubs are looking a little thin and the ornamental grasses are faded and crackly. And true, the heavy snow of the past months has left behind its share of late-winter mud. But green is winning the battle with brown for color supremacy, snowdrops and a few irises are budding, the hellebores are in bloom, and some of the more than 40,000 bulbs planted here have started to poke up — all harbingers of the full palette of color the next couple of months will bring. What’s far less up for debate is the transformation this garden itself has undergone. Three decades ago it was six overgrown, trash-strewn and largely forgotten acres sitting next to an East neighborhood that young sons. The result was revelatory: “I began to realize And with that, ’s art got a new canvas. that Sprout created: the paths and hedges most New Yorkers preferred to avoid. The difference that the English people designed gardens the way I was “My life changed irrevocably,” she says. “I never went and trees, and especially the two rows of flowering crab- between then and now? That would be Lynden Miller painting,” she says. “They were painting with plants.” back to the studio. I loved painting with plants more than apple trees that flank the central lawn of the Italianate herself, a 5' 3" white-haired force of nature. Lynden left New York for England as a painter who I loved just painting.” Center Garden and remain arguably the garden’s single gardened. When she returned two years later she was a Like Olmsted when he won the design most defining feature. Painting With Plants gardener who painted. competition, Lynden had never actually carried out a In the fall of 1982, Lynden spread Betty Sprout’s plans Lynden’s passion for began with an interest public landscape design when she started work on the across her kitchen table to rethink the design. Replanting in art, and her interest in art began at St. Timothy’s The Artist Gets a New Canvas Conservatory Garden. And inexperience was hardly the began that spring. Lynden had old, overgrown plants School. “I had this wonderful teacher,” she recalls, “one Central Park, the 800-plus-acre oasis in the middle of only challenge she faced. In addition to designing the removed and gave those that still had value to community of those teachers that changes your life.” , was the vision of legendary landscape garden, she was responsible for raising money for its gardens in . New shrubs, large perennials, That teacher was Jan Carlstrom, a young Smith Col- designer , another New Yorker who revitalization. Even some of those who contributed felt and ornamental grasses went in first, followed by other lege graduate whose art history course flipped Lynden’s had been inspired by the public gardens of England. In the project was doomed to failure. She says people would plantings. She used tens of thousands of plants in intellectual engagement switch to “on.” Lynden went on 1858 Olmsted and architect Calvin Vaux won a design point in the direction of East Harlem, and using words hundreds of varieties, approaching the work much like to major in art history at Smith, and went from there to competition to create the park, and after 15 years of loaded with racial and social-class commentary, would she approached the collages she had painted. A massive Washington, D.C., where she took a succession of jobs construction marked by battles with park commissioners, say, they will trash it. “People said you can’t do anything display of tulips is a big spring attraction; another of that she says rewarded her mostly for how fast she could Central Park opened. nice there,” Lynden says. “Everyone said I was insane. chrysanthemums draws visitors in the fall. type. The work was pleasant enough, but unsatisfying, By the start of the 20th century, however, the park But I didn’t listen to them.” “It’s all designed to be a kaleidoscope of changing so Lynden began studying art to see if she could become had fallen into decline, full of “bare earth, decorated with color, and shape, and form, and texture,” Lynden says. a painter. scraggly patches of grass and weeds,” according to his- Beautiful Bones “I designed it so that it would have something interesting It was around this time — the early 1960s — that torian . A revival began in the 1930s, thanks The Central Park Conservatory Garden takes its name in it all year ’round.” Lynden met Leigh Miller, a fellow Democrat who held a in large part to the efforts of , a powerful from the majestic conservatory (greenhouse) that used to By 1983, Lynden’s improvements were starting to position with the Kennedy Administration. They married, but polarizing urban planner. By the 1970s Central Park be there. Robert Moses had it torn down in the 1930s, take hold, and East Harlem residents began visiting and in 1968 moved to , where Leigh had slipped back into decline, falling victim to the city’s after which responsibility for the redesign of the garden’s the garden again. People from other parts of the city worked in international banking with American Express. economic and social struggles. plantings fell to a woman who was ideally named for followed, venturing into an area that for years they had Lynden opened an art studio; her signature paintings In 1979, became the first this task: M. Betty Sprout. feared entering. In her book, , Plants, and People were large landscape collages. person to hold the title of Central Park Administrator, Betty Sprout envisioned a formal garden, in contrast (W.W. Norton & Co., 2009), Lynden tells the story of She had always loved plants. When she was a child, charged by Mayor with restoring Central Park. to the more natural style favored by Olmsted. Her basic taking a cab from a meeting to the garden an uncle she adored would take her in Lynden was with Betsy Rogers, and confided to design, which remains in place today, called for three late one afternoon while the restoration was under- search of orchids, and he once let her help him build a her that she was becoming disillusioned with the world of sections, each with a different style: Italian in the center, way. When she told the driver where she was going, he garden at her grandmother’s house. In New York, Lynden professional art. Rogers had an idea. “She said, ‘There’s French to the north and English in the south garden. warned her she’d be killed if she went in the garden. enrolled in horticulture courses at the New York Botanical an overgrown six-acre garden in the northern end of When Lynden entered the scene nearly a half-century She persuaded him to park the cab and come take a Garden. When her husband’s job took them to London Central Park,’” Lynden recalls, “‘and I think you should later, years of neglect had failed to destroy what she look at it with her. It was early May, and the cab driver’s for two years, she used the opportunity to visit every restore it.’” That overgrown garden was the Conservatory calls the “beautiful bones” of the original design. The jaw dropped at the sight of thousands of daffodils and garden she could get to, often dragging along her two Garden. “bones” she refers to are the more permanent parts of the tulips and hyacinths in full bloom. “I’ve got to go home

Far left and right: The Conservatory Garden. Middle: A stunning example of contrasting form and color. 12 V É R I T É S A N S PEUR ST. T IMOTHY’ S SCHOOL , directly behind the 300 got people responding toher. Lynden’s success with the Transforming Spaces Public lovers. had become more popular with drugdealersthanbook a section of that over that the Manhattan years midtown of section a “ getmy and to wife,” Lynden. to said man the publicgardendesign.com. otherherare on and gardens these of website,tions between baby” isatiny, long-neglected, Y campus. 9/11 is amemorialtothe firefighters the community lost on S H R O Park . G 79 major time commitment, with contracts lasting two years heads acompany that works toincrease the availability Miller, aformer N bus, advocacy. and “ everything from designandmaintenance tofundraising others seekingtocreate beautifulpublic spaces, covering for guide herhow-to a as book, serves part in which exactly the opposite. that their city cares about them;aneglectedpark does citizens to park, message says,a she maintained sends place. in is program stewardship long-term a besure to enough stay long to board Lynden on wants and maintenance, ongoing is partextremely important and third a planting, the is another and design, the or more. W callydeserted. I began. project “ restoration has been director of the t just looked it. S quare; and ork housingprojects. ed arden in , followed by another for the ew udson Pierthe therinclude projects he’ll never believe this.” th hen thingsare beautiful, people respond tothem.” “People used to say they needed an armed escort above W Lynden hasleft green thumbprintsallover the city. “ she when mind wrotein maintenance had Lynden -foot flower bedsalongthe sidesofthe mainlawn in . S I H S Y C wouldn’t have passedthison,” she says. he hasdone more totransform the public space in hen Lynden takes on a new project, it becomes a treet, and this was ork ook, ; T olumbia hen came a project with the 96 S R T he has worked ongarden designaround C iver Park;British the hat’s because ifone part of the challenge is th and ity thananyone else,” says her son, T ribute Park in I tried to make it as beautiful as pos as beautiful make it as to tried I I U N was afraid that if if that afraid was t was all overgrown, and it was practi ew niversityher hired its beautify to 97 th Y W A ork C S project she callsher “favorite agner Park in Battery Park treets onPark 105 onservatory C C I onservatory th t wasn’t actually dangerous. R ity councilman who now I ockaway, Queens, which n 6,100 S 44 N treet,” says Lynden, who G 1986 ew

arden at arden W I -square-foot park got run over gotrun by a N aterfront Park aterfront in Y she plantedtwo G ork Public Library, ew A arden since her G venue. Y arden certainly ork Botanical H anover A well G D C ifford escrip entral N C sible. sible.

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to themabout parks andtheir importance incity life. guided tour ofthe as part of a course the girls take. Lynden gives them a T graduated. she with aschoolshe hadn’t beentooinvolved with since about her work, kickingintomotionher re-acquaintance R courses at she travels around the country to give lectures and teaches ton. at further. Lynden’s first love and primary focus, her impact extends T Reconnecting St. With Timothy’s I ence. investment in public space can make an enormous differ of affordable housing in the city. “ great example ofsomeone who hasdone that.” go out andchange the world,” role modelfor the students. “ horticulture totouchthe soul;two, because she’s agreat of the way she blends aesthetics of art with the science of forthe syllabus Lyndenon is two one, reasons: because these safe andrelaxing placesfor trip. “ S “ the new academic building;andother spaces. H lined the selectionandplacement ofplantsfor the campus landscape inthe years tocome.) the support might her that fellowalumnae hoping is school was undertaking. ( the advocacy organization complement to a comprehensive facilities master plan the didamaster planofplantingsfor the school, a movesome thingsaround,” she says. “ the results, butpossibly them. adjusting “ H time, and when Lynden attendsthe dedication of cancel. S had hoped to be on campus to supervise, but moving ofthe performing arts.” in progress. n the early ’ S ugarman, a andy hit the day she was to arrive, forcing her to forcing arrive, to day the was she andy hit andy imothy’s studentsto hough the public gardens of the of publicgardens hough ouse courtyard; the Moongate all inlate he’s soinnovative, but really down toearth,” says S T S A T tony Brook S everal ago, everal years few partner design yearsLynden and ago he first plantings went in the ground last fall. Lynden he course is called called is course he A S howing few signs of slowing down in her mid- he took responsibility into her own hands to create nd she did this at a time people didn’t accept that. S T S tevens invited Lynden to campus to speak to campus to Lynden invited tevens he helped turn his spring everything will bloom for bloom first the will everything spring his N A ew S 80 S pril, she looksforward not just toseeing omeone once calledgardening the slowest t. s, that was radicalthinking.” U Y E T ork niversity and has done work at Prince ach ach year imothy’sjunior who this on was year’s N ew U S niversity. N t. Y 12 T ew A ork Botanical T R acres of concrete into gardens heory of Knowledge, and and Knowledge, of heory N lways looking ahead, Lynden imothy’s imothy’s andy takes a busload of of andybusload a takes Y ew W ork tomeet with Lynden R N e want our graduatesto Y S andy says. “Lynden isa ew G he is chair emeritus of orkers for Parks. N S he has proved that an arden; ew Y H ork A Y ead of G garden isalways ork.” T arden andtalks I C may try to D heir planout ityremain ixon H S urricane chool chool R H onda onda D C all, 70 ixon A arter S

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The Daffodil Project Over the following weeks and months an army of Sanctuaries for the Soul The Pied Piper of Public Space 2001 was a mayoral election year in New York City, and thousands of volunteers set to work planting the bulbs in This past fall, New Yorkers struggled with a devastating In January, Frank Robinson, president and CEO of the in late summer, New Yorkers for Parks was arranging all five of New York’s boroughs. The retail chain Target event of a very different kind: Hurricane Sandy. The Lewis Ginter in Richmond, Virginia, events to let people hear what the candidates had to say donated trowels and gardening gloves. Volunteers massive storm claimed more than 40 lives in the city, invited Lynden to his city. Over three days she met with about the city’s parks. The city was allocating about one- from other cities came to help, including one group that flooded parts of the subway system, destroyed homes and civic and business leaders, with members of the design quarter of one percent of its budget toward operating drove eight hours through an early-season snowstorm businesses, left tens of thousands without power, and community, and with others who had an interest in public funds for nearly 30,000 acres of parks, and New Yorkers to plant bulbs in East Harlem’s . caused an estimated $18 billion in damage. spaces, offering insight and advice, all with the goal, for Parks was advocating for an increase in that allocation In November, the prime minister of Slovakia, in town Included in that $18 billion was significant damage Robinson says, of helping to “inspire a greater vision of to a full one percent. to run in the New York Marathon, planted bulbs in to the city’s parks. The storm covered at least four of what the city could look like.” The mood was festive on a Sunday in early September . In Brooklyn, on a site with a clear Lynden’s projects with water and sewage. She knows of In some cities, Robinson says, citing New York and as supporters gathered for a rally in Union Square Park. view of Ground Zero, volunteers cleared a vacant lot one park that lost thousands of evergreens because of salt as examples, the battle to demonstrate the value The candidates jockeying to succeed as and planted 20,000 daffodils in the shape of the Twin and wind damage. As this story goes to press, the true of public gardens has largely been won, while other cities mayor all seemed to support an increase. Two days later, Towers. extent of the damage remains unknown, as the spring are in an election or an economic downturn or maybe a however, funding for parks was about the last thing on “Everyone wanted to do something to make the city bloom has only just gotten underway. sequester away from debilitating cutbacks in support. people’s minds. It was September 11. feel better,” Lynden says. “They were out there on their You could argue that with all of the damage, and all That’s why he invited Lynden. People listen to her, he “I could see the smoke out my window,” says Lynden, hands and knees in the soil. It made people feel good.” of the disruption, and all of the broken things in New says, because she’s one of the luminaries in the field, whose at 98th Street and is eight Then in the spring of 2002, people had another York that need to be fixed, the city’s parks don’t deserve along with Frederick Law Olmsted and her friend Betsy miles from where terrorists had crashed planes into the reason to feel good. The daffodils bloomed — a million to be too high up on the list of priorities. And there’s a Rogers. It’s like bringing in Martin Scorsese to talk about World Trade Center towers. “I walked up to the Con- of them, ringing the city in a vibrant yellow memorial to good chance that Lynden B. Miller would take up the film, or Jane Goodall to discuss chimpanzees. serv atory Garden because I wanted to be out in nature. the 2,753 people who died in New York on 9/11. other side of that argument. She would tell you how “She is like the Pied Piper articulating the importance It was filled with people who came up to me and said, The Daffodil Project didn’t end there. Each year in parks are good for tourism, good for business, good for of beauty in our lives,” says Robinson. “She is so deter- ‘Thank God this is still here. This gives us hope.’” New York more daffodils are planted — over five million real estate. But mostly she’d tell you how they’re good mined, and in such a constructive way. She is an example Restoring hope was on the minds of many in the days since the project started, including bulbs around public for the soul. of what one person can achieve when they have a passion following the attacks. Among the concerned was a housing projects and the Rikers Island Jail in Queens. “I try to make parks as beautiful as I know how,” for what they do and a focus for what that passion can Dutch bulb supplier named Hans van Waardenberg. He Some 40,000 volunteers have been involved, making it Lynden says. “New York is a very hectic, noisy place. accomplish.” con tacted her, wanting to do something to help. Lynden one of the biggest community projects in New York City It’s also a very exciting place, and we all love New York. On Lynden’s last night in Richmond, after an intense replied, “You don’t have any extra bulbs, do you?” history. In 2007, Mayor Michael Bloomberg made the But we can only live here because of places like Central three days of meetings, Robinson thought it would be Van Waardenberg arranged for a million daffodil daffodil the city’s official flower. Park. It gives people a connection with nature. It makes best to call off a scheduled dinner so his guest would have bulbs to be given to the city. He, Lynden and NY parks “We have a Daffodil Breakfast every year,” says them feel that their city cares about them. Having a chance to just relax in her room. Lynden, wonder- commissioner formed a partnership Lynden, whose goal is to plant one daffodil for every New beautiful places to visit that are free and that are for them ing why there was a hole in her evening schedule, asked with the Dutch government. When New York Harbor Yorker, or just over eight million in all. “It’s always been makes them feel differently about their city. Parks are Robinson what they were going to do that night. He reopened after the attacks, ships began arriving carrying in Bryant Park, and we give awards to people who’ve sanctuaries for people. They come in and sit down and explained his thinking, adding, “You must be exhausted.” thousands of boxes of the bulbs, which were distributed to worked with the project. My husband used to say it was feel like this oasis is for them.” “I am,” Lynden replied. “But I don’t want to miss parks all over the city. The Daffodil Project was underway. the only place you could go to cry at breakfast.” anything.” %

Far left: Lynden Miller, very much at home in the Central Park Conservatory Garden. Middle: The Daffodil Project. Right: A tiny, 6,100-square-foot park between 96th and 97th Streets on Park Avenue.