By 1880, Frederick Law Olmsted was the recognized father of landscape architecture. His office hummed with work for the US Capitol grounds, the Boston/Brookline Park System, Mount Royal Park in Quebec and John Phillip’s new country seat, Moraine Farm. Moving his home and office to Brookline in 1883, Olmsted and his design doctrines defined the nation’s design trends for landscape architecture for almost a century. Charles Eliot, the self-proclaimed “landscape wanderer,” was the first official unpaid apprentice in Olmsted’s new office. From 1880-1890 their professional passions built cataclysmic shifts in our ability to enhance, preserve and appreciate nature. We are thrilled to have two nationally recognized scholars look at these two men and this critical, career shaping decade from 1880-1890.
Lauren Meier is associate editor of the final volume of the Olmsted Papers Project, which includes Olmsted’s work at Moraine Farm, and founding coordinator of the National Park Service’s Historic Landscape Initiative. Keith Morgan is an architectural historian and professor emeritus of American and European Architecture at Boston University, interested in the relationships between architecture, urban planning, and landscape architecture. Both speakers have an extensive award-winning resume of research and writing in landscape preservation and design.