Garden

Clayton," now known as the Nassau County Museum of Art, was given to Childs Frick and his bride, Frances, as a wedding present from his father, Henry Clay Frick, in 1919. The Georgian mansion, surrounded by two hundred acres, was designed by Ogden Codman, Jr. in 1900.

Mrs. Frick, who lived at "Clayton," was an avid horticulturist and active garden club member. She hired Marian Coffin in 1925 to re-design the formal garden. At the peak of her career at that time, Coffin considered her design at Clayton to be one of her finest.

Coffin's overall plan for the garden was to clarify, strengthen, and enhance the existing arrangement of walks, flower beds, hedges, and entrances to complement and enhance the design of the mansion.

Before the end of her career, Coffin had undoubtedly foreseen the eventual deterioration of her ephemeral creation. Although the extensive flower borders she designed for Clayton are now gone, the shrubs and walkways remain, so that the basic structure of Coffin's plan can still be appreciated, along with the magnificent Milliken-Bevin trellis, restored by the Roslyn Landmark Society in 1989. Other private contributions have enabled the Museum to partially restore and maintain the rose garden and the azalea garden.

A generous grant from New York State's Environmental Quality Bond Act, awarded to the Museum in 1993, has allowed the Museum to plan to restore this magnificent garden. This renovation carefully sustains the integrity and essence of Marian Coffin's creation while making the garden widely accessible to the public.

Before & After
From the 1930s	As it Looks Today
Fountains
Features
Garden Trellis	Shrubbery Beds
Garden	Garden