Pavilion

History

Pavilion was a term that appeared throughout the Eastern colonies and, later, the states from New England to the Deep South. Advertisements for garden services in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries included the pavilion in lists of structures for sale. Ephraim Chambers’s 1741–43 definition of a pavilion noted three standard meanings of the term as it was used during the colonial and early Republic periods. First, it referred to a tent-like or domed building under a single roof [Fig. 1]; second, it denoted a projecting piece in front of or on the corner of a building; and third, it described a garden building also known as a summerhouse, temple, or pleasure house. All three denotations have relevance in the history of the designed landscape.

Samuel Johnson’s 1755 definition suggested that a pavilion could be a moveable or temporary structure. This type of pavilion was also described in an early nineteenth-century account of structures built to accommodate socializing and dancing at Custis-Lee Mansion (Arlington House) in Arlington, Va. Alexander Jackson Davis in 1836 sketched a canopied pavilion for Blithe-wood [Fig. 2]. Its delicate appearance suggests that it might have been temporary. Pavilions, however, were more frequently permanent structures that were part of an architectural or landscape design.

In his design for the University of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson placed along the main lawn two rows of individual professor’s houses, which he identified as pavilions. These temple-like buildings, each ornamented with a different classical order, were linked by covered walkways or piazzas and backed by enclosed gardens. In this instance, the choice of the term with its garden overtones suggests that Jefferson conceived of the whole composition based on the interrelationship of architecture and landscape [Fig. 3]. At Monticello, Jefferson again planned temple-like structures that he called pavilions, which stood at the end of each of two symmetrical walkways that extended from the main house into the garden [Fig. 4]. His 1808 letter indicates that he planned to use at least one of these new pavilions as a library.

The application of the term “pavilion” to a structure that was attached to a house as a porch-like space seems to have gained popularity with the advent of house pattern books in the 1840s. “More than a veranda,” Downing wrote, the pavilion was “a room in the open air.” For the frontispiece of an issue of the Horticulturist, he used a drawing by Davis depicting the pavilion at Montgomery Place in Dutchess County, N.Y., through which the surrounding landscape was seen [Fig. 5]. In another view of the same estate, Davis depicted what was described in the accompanying article as two types of pavilions: an attached structure and a separate temple-like building in the garden [Fig. 6].

The garden pavilion was illustrated in Downing’s publications as a wooden structure made in a variety of light framework types. It had a single roof and generally provided shelter for a garden seat. Some pavilions were simple and rustic in appearance, with climbing plants and curved branches adding to their character [Fig. 7], while others offered a more finished treatment, such as circular or pedimental temples designed in the classical style [Fig. 8]. Downing’s advocacy of a “unity of expression” and his concern for the appropriateness of style is illustrated by his choice of a pavilion that corresponded in style to the garden and its architectural or topographical features.

Pavilions were often located at the terminus of a walk, the summit of a hill, or the edge of a garden to provide resting and viewing places. The plan for Calverton, near Baltimore [Fig. 9], is an example of a pleasure ground design that uses such criteria to determine the placement of pavilions within the landscape.

The term “pavilion” was often used interchangeably with “summerhouse” and “temple” (see Summerhouse and Temple). A regional preference is not discernable in the textual evidence for any of these terms. Only Noah Webster, in the later edition of An American Dictionary of the English Language (1848), suggested that the word “pavilion” was not appropriate for describing a summerhouse in a garden, without explanation. More commonly, pavilion was used broadly to encompass a variety of garden building types. Within one passage, Downing described one pavilion that formed the north wing of the house at Montgomery Place, and another separate garden temple as a “little rustic pavilion” located at the water’s edge. In either case, the function of the pavilion was to offer an open-air structure with a sheltering roof that was linked visually and spatially with the landscape. Downing (1850) used this particular feature to illustrate the “story of a desideratum growing out of our climate,” and the American adaptation in design to both northern and southern conditions.

-- Therese O'Malley