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History of Early American Landscape Design

Orangery

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History

The term orangery described both a grove of orange trees and a structure in which citrus trees were cultivated. William Bartram used the term in 1791 to describe a grove of native trees left standing within a cleared ground and incorporated into a designed plantation, and, therefore, a natural feature in the landscape. Samuel Johnson (1755) and Noah Webster (1848) defined an orangery as an area where orange trees were planted, or as Ephraim Chambers (1741–43) wrote, “used for the parterre.” John Evelyn, in his 1693 translation of Jean de La Quintinie, used the term to refer to any place stocked with orange trees, whether indoors or out. The most common usage, however, refers to the architecture of plant-keeping houses, often synonymous with greenhouse, hothouse, or conservatory. In this sense, the orangery could be a separate building, or a structure that was either part of or attached to a greenhouse in which citrus and other exotic fruits and flowers were kept [Fig. 1] (see Conservatory, Greenhouse, and Hothouse).

The term “orangery” originated in Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries when citrus fruit was highly valued. The orangery was a showcase for the nobility with the best-known examples found at Versailles, St. Petersburg, and Vienna. In eighteenth-century America, however, the term seems to have been used rarely outside garden treatises. Perhaps its aristocratic associations made Americans reluctant to use it. The more generic terms “greenhouse” and “conservatory” replaced it, as did specific names used to describe its precise contents, such as “pinery” (for pineapples), “peachery,” and “grapery” or “vinery.”

Although several imported treatises contain the term “orangery,” it is conspicuously absent in major American publications by Bernard M’Mahon, C. M. Hovey, and A. J. Downing—except when describing eighteenth- century greenhouses. For example, in 1837 Hovey used orangery to describe Bartram’s by-then venerable century-old greenhouse in Philadelphia. In his “Historical Sketches,” Downing described the eighteenth-century greenhouses at William Hamilton’s seat, the Woodlands, as orangeries. These colonial greenhouses were called orangeries in the nineteenth century because they represented an older building type that was

characterized by unglazed roofs. This earlier type of plant-keeping structure, built of stone or brick with large windows and a solid, unglazed roof was found at Wye House [Fig. 2]; Fairhill [Fig. 3]; and Lt. Gov. James Hamilton’s estate, Bush Hill, near Philadelphia. This type had an architectural style consistent with the main house, with a regular entablature and cornice and large windows that were often roundheaded, separated by columns or piers. At the time they were built, they were most probably greenhouses, hothouses, or conservatories, although it is clear that they were used for keeping citrus trees (see Greenhouse and Hothouse for a discussion of heating systems). This type of greenhouse construction fell out of fashion once gardeners began to realize the benefits of increased light and perpendicular light for growing plants. As a greater proportion of glazing became technically possible with cast-iron construction, the design of plant houses shifted from the shingle-roofed brick or stone orangery to the glasshouse [Fig. 4]. With these changes in structure and material, J. C. Loudon, writing in the early nineteenth century, concluded that the orangery was the greenhouse of the previous century [Fig. 5]. Thus, nineteenth- century authors writing about historical greenhouses distinguished them from the cast-iron and glass structures by calling them orangeries. Twentieth-century garden historians and archaeologists have continued this practice. The orangery, however, did not completely disappear as an option in new construction. Jane Loudon provided a late reference in 1845 when she wrote that the orangery was a house with an opaque roof intended only for orange trees. She asserted the suitability of non-greenhouse construction to that use. Further evidence of the orangery’s continued use is in Robert B. Leuchars’s 1850 Practical Treatise on the Construction, Heating, and Ventilation of Hothouses, in which he described John Hopkins’s very large structure at Clifton Mansion [Fig. 6].

Scholars have pointed out that in the early colonial period, several greenhouses for citrus cultivation were built by wealthy families who had access to international trade networks. It took skill and money to build a good greenhouse for citrus because glass was expensive, servants were required to maintain it, and skilled gardeners needed to cultivate the fruit.1 Therefore, they were associated with the privileged and cultured elite [Fig. 7]. Archaeologist Carmen Weber has argued that this association was so well established in the colonial period that in a portrait of Margaret Tilghman Carroll by Charles Willson Peale the simple inclusion of orange leaves was sufficient to symbolize and convey her control of property and considerable wealth.2

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