Jo--given your fairly formal, VERY symmetrical house, (at least form the pic I saw) I think your gut had it right. Our guts frequently do--if only we would listen to them!

melanie

Wow .. thats old .. I wonder if any ghost are around there .. maybe you should ask him ??? ...

Now that you have researched a bit, what is your gut instinct? What are you drawn to? What feels right among the choices you have outlined(an earlier, more formal colonial style; the Georgian period)?

Maybe you need to wait until spring to see some real gardens of these periods(like at the Old Sturbridge Village restoration where they have your era home, several in-town well-off residents' gardens, simpler gardens of the working class, etc). Maybe actually seeing some period gardens with your home in mind will help tip the cart one way or the other.
G.

SayPoint,
Before deciding on style why don't you do some exploratory investigation. Locate a metal detector. Go over the whole yard with it and try to figure out the former location of the well, outhouse, barn or other structures. If you decide to landscape around the time period when your house was built then well and outhouse locations are important if you wish to restore these (a garden shed could be substituted for the privy). Both features also play an important role in replicating early landscapes, no matter the style. You know where the straightest path led to....right? Also, move around the property pounding a piece of rebar into the ground several feet down. I have found the remains of old brick walkways doing this. On one site, using a metal detector, I uncovered a pile of hundreds of very old cut nails in excellent condition and they were used in the house restoration. You just never know what is lurking beneath the soil waiting to be discovered. You may find nothing or....you may come across something which will define your whole design.

ooooh--sounds like fun. Treasure hunting! I like the idea!

melanie

Nandina always and forever has the best ideas derived from a wealth of experience. The above post should find its way to the FAQs so it doesn't fade away onto page 3 or 4 in a few weeks. This is a technique many people with old homes wanting to restore the grounds can use as a starting place.
Thanks, Nandina.
G.

An interesting principle of restoration is to design for your clients 1830's perspective rather than as a historic recreation of the vernacular.
I don't know that people in the 1830's had the idea of landscaping and certainly their idea of a garden would not have been coextensive with the landscape. Gertrude Jykell did not come with her idea about perennial gardens as part of the landscape until the early 1900's and yet her idea do fit rather well with earlier sensibilities and needs.
regarding needs: they didn't have cars back then and so would not have put the horse barn as close as possible to the house. Of course, as a modern designer you might see this as an opportunity to include plantings in the style of a Gertrude Jykel.
As for the landscape, they would have thought of the landscape as a give, the place is what it is and maybe a shade tree or a shrub or two with flowers just for fun. A cutting garden might have been included, a vege garden might have been included.
Was your house a country house? or a city house?
What visions of paradise did the clients have? You might want to landscape so as to leave a reminder of this vision of their home. So what you do now would not have been what they did then but rather what they would have done then if they were here now, and had you as a designer?
Their perspectives are quite different regarding thier needs, thier sense of living, and thier sense of beauty. They would have a different sense of time: a short walk from the garage would not seem difficult for them, if the house is a country house it might be the place they went to for a week at the shortest, or they might have had guests for a couple of months at a time. The woman would have a different agenda in the morning than getting two kids off to soccer and pick up the groceries and etc. etc.
Their aesthetics were different to some degree, for instance, may have been more interested n fragrance than in shrub shape
Did they have gardeners?
You might think about why they sited the house in the way that they did and so find yourself designing in some landscape to recreate those reasons.
How did they want to be seen by their neighbors? etc. etc.
The very idea of landscape was not common back then.
So, your question begs the question of vernacular of the time vs. the perspective of the time. Which is more authentic? I think the perspective is most authentic and that you can make reference to that as well as referencing some of the vernacular that you find nostalgic.
,

Have you looked at the prints of Currier & Ives as a representation of what gardens of he time might have been like (they published from 1834-1907).

I'll try to post a sample in the gallery.

Keep ideas coming, it helps unlock the freezing brain. I have to keep reminding myself that weather of eighty and ninety is on its way, six or seven months that is. It is 2 below zero on my front porch. My poor birds but they have access to the barn which should be warmer.

You might try Monticello. They have an entire area on the web devoted to late 18th and early 19th century plants and gardens. There's a seminar this summer in June for historic landscapes of this period.

Here is a link that might be useful: Jefferson's Gardens

Wow. Great ideas.
Melanie, you're right, of course, about the gut. I keep forgetting.
MK, there are stories about strange goings-on in the house, things get 'moved' so I can't find them, and some of the neighbors wave garlic at me when they meet me out by the street, but I have yet to get any help in the yard! I wish!
Ginger, absolutely will take a drive as soon as the weather warrants a visit to OS. I can't believe I live so close and have never been.
Nandina, great ideas! Being near the shore, there is a shop in town that rents metal detectors. I never thought of that, or of doing any exploratory poking in the soil. The well is under the kitchen (how cool is that?) and there is another cistern with a stone cap right outside the back door. The 'carriage house' aka the garage, is still there, I don't know if it is original to the house but the brick is the same, so it may be. Also, it had a floor of large granite slabs just like the basement of the house, until a PO took them out to make the patio and walks.
The house has 'orphaned' front entries, so there may have been some kind of paths or small drive out front. Because of the corner lot, the drive is on the side street. Also, half the property was sold off in the 1960s so some of the original stuff may have been over there. As for the straight line, just past the garage front is the septic system, a brick cesspool estimated to be 100 yrs. old, still working fine. Right about where the privy might have been?
AshaK, I actually do know something about the early occupants. See my post on the LD forum title 'period style gardens'. There is info about the home's history and early occupants as well as pics. Part of what my innards told me were just what you suggest--a 'formal-ish' structure with exuberant perennial plantings, mixed borders and I'm dying for some old-fashioned roses, especially climbers.
JohnD, I'll check them out.
MissRR, went there three years ago when I lived in VA. I enjoyed the visit, and the gardens were nice from a historical perspective, but I'm not sure how I would adapt his large scale design to such a small lot (one acre). My 'innards' are telling me I want a less 'open' feeling.
Wonderful suggestions, all.
Thanks so much,
Jo

While I can't offer any better advice on design than what is here, I went to LD and took a peek at your house. What a great house!

If you are looking into where outbuildings and major features were, you may want to investigate fire insurance maps of the period, if any exist for your area. The Sanborn maps are the most well known, but were started later(1867). In any case, checking these out may alert you to outbuildings that were added to the property later and give you an idea of where to look when you start using a metal detector. Remember, finding a path and/or foundation may not mean it was there during the period you are looking at.

Hello! My husband and I are in a similar situation. We recently purchased an 1816 former stagecoach inn/tavern. The gardens are beautiful but neglected. I've been researching the topic and found a great book - "The New Traditional Garden" by Michael Weishan. It contains a lot of helpful/practical information for houses of all ages. For two full seasons, I've focused on getting acquainted with what is in the gardens, looking for "ghosts" (old stone walls or othere indicators of old beds), and applying TLC (pruning, weeding). Last summer, we planted a colonial style veggie/herb garden with mostly period appropriate plants and materials. A lot of the information as to how to accomplish this came from the Weishan book. Regards, Shelley