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player ready...To kick-off the celebration for the 150th birthday of the Frances Willard House Museum and Archives in Evanston, nationally recognized author and garden historian Barbara Geiger presented the new master restoration plan for the Williard gardens at a program on July 9.
Funded in part by a National Trust for Historic Preservation grant, the plan is designed to bring the gardens and grounds to back to their 1890s Victorian splendor.
Owned by the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and managed by the Frances Willard Historical Association, the house was home to author and social activist Frances Willard, (1839-1898), a founder and later president of the WCTU, and for some years it served as informal headquarters of the WCTU.
The house, built in 1865 by Willard’s father, Josiah, was established as a WCTU museum in 1900, two years after Frances’ death. It has been closed for exterior and interior restoration projects since last fall. The work is well under way, and an official unveiling of the remodel is planned for this fall.
The garden plan design was developed by Geiger, who specializes in late 19th and early 20th century landscape history and preservation. Her professional consulting practice includes projects for Chicago’s Jackson and Washington Parks to gardens at the Baha’i House of Worship in Wilmette.
FWHA Executive Director Glen Madeja serves as Head Gardner for this project, which will be one of the last of the restoration works implemented. Full funding for the garden is not yet in hand, said Madeja. However, she explained, “We believe we will be able to raise the money and will likely do the majority of the planting and landscaping within two years, while other areas of the WCTU Local Historic District grounds may also be revamped as funding allows.”
According to Madeja, the garden plan relied on historic photos as a basis for the recreation of the 1887-1891 look of the front gardens and those under the first floor office. Those are the most historically significant areas of the Willard House, which Willard herself called “Rest Cottage.” Willard was, said Madeja, “an avid traveler who returned often to her Evanston home for rest and relaxation.”
The new garden will be styled in the Victorian vernacular manner of the ca.1890, said Geiger, “using an interpretive design to reflect Willard’s life and visual authenticity of the period, avoiding Victorian caricature styles, and using historic focal points like the front circle garden, the climbing vine on a ladder, and the planted urn, along with references to Willard’s favorite color, blue.”
Geiger’s plan will create a garden with a variety of annuals and perennials and incorporating historically appropriate, low-scale plantings. This design allows for ample spread of individual plants.
The restoration will support the FWHA’s efforts to update the Frances Willard House and reinvigorate the spirit of Willard’s historic contributions.
“Most people believe that Willard and the WCTU were only about temperance, and that the WCTU was the reason Evanston was a dry town,” said Madeja. “They are wrong on both counts.”
Willard spent far more time promoting issues that are still being fought over today. On becoming president of the WCTU in 1879, said Madeja, Willard “adopted her ‘Do Everything’ platform, empowering women to advocate for rights in all aspects of their lives, suffrage, (the right to vote), equal work for equal pay, marital and religious rights and rights against sexual and domestic violence.”
The hope is that starting in the garden, visitors will be intrigued and come in to discover the continuing relevance of Willard and her work, said Janet Olson, Assistant University Archivist at Northwestern University and volunteer archivist with FWHA. “The plan is that … the visual interest will build and help to keep the place relevant and pique the community’s interest.”
Renovation updates and event information at franceswillardhouse.org