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Bartlett F. Kenney · Public domain
19th century · 1822–1903
Frederick Law Olmsted
Frederick Law Olmsted · United States
Father of American landscape architecture
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, he worked as a journalist and social critic. With his partner Calvert Vaux he designed New York's Central Park, then many other urban parks including Brooklyn's Prospect Park, and is regarded as the founder of American landscape architecture. The architect Daniel Burnham said of him: 'He paints with lakes and wooded slopes.'
Where the story happened
Los lugares que dejó
Historia · Central Park
The Greensward Plan and the vanished Seneca Village
In April 1858 the park commission chose Olmsted and Vaux's 'Greensward Plan'. It was the first urban park Olmsted designed with Vaux; he went on to design a series of city parks and is regarded as the founder of American landscape architecture. But the park came at a cost: before work began in 1857, the city took the land and demolished the existing settlements on the site, including Seneca Village, a community of mostly Black residents.
