Arden House & Garden Tour

The first weekend we came to visit in Arden, Cynthia took us on the House & Garden Tour, an event sponsored by Arden Community Recreation Association (ACRA). The tour isn't open to everyone. You have to live in the Ardens or be guest of someone who is a resident. It is a free event designed to show off house and garden projects and remodels to neighbors. We saw more than a handful of houses on that first Sunday. Coming as we did, from a cookie-cutter development that varied little from three main house designs, seeing the variety in Arden houses was a rainbow feast for our beige-weary senses.

When it comes to architecture,  Arden started modestly, but purposefully. One of Arden's two founders was the architect Will Price and he imbued the early Arden houses with the style of the Tudor Cottages. I have been doing some reading about the early planning of Arden and discovered that one of my oldest and dearest friends lives in a neighborhood in Wayne, PA for which Will Price was a prominent architect. I happened to visit Missy a few days after this year's house and garden tour. Missy is more than an architecture buff after getting her Master's Degree in Interior Architecture and Design from Drexel. She showed me examples of Price's work which was loftier in scale than the stuff of Arden, humble by comparison.

Treehouse built by Jeff Politis

Humble is a good word to describe Arden architecture. The focus of Arden was always community. Small, but meticulously gardened lots, giving way to large public spaces where the real action happened--from baseball games to hop-rocking and from live theater and shows to the Arden Fair. The cottages were not meant to denote your status. That was to be kept under wraps as you linked arms with those from all socio-economic levels. Still, Ardenites aren't Amish. Pride is not a sin. We like to show off our palaces. But here, palace is not a celebration of how much square footage you can cram under one roof, but how many stories you can build on one foundation. This year's tour included The Jungalow, a home built for Upton Sinclair with monies from the Fels-Naptha Soap fortune (the same fortune that financed Arden). The Jungalow, in its present state, bears little resemblance to that cabin, but features remain in the original part of the house: the paneled walls, the built-in-book shelves, the craftsman-era fireplaces that are ubiquitous in early Arden houses.

G-Arden--community garden of Arden

Other spots on the tour included a magnificent treehouse, built by Arden's newly elected town chair, who is on sabbatical from career and really enjoying his time with his young boys. We saw the original farmhouse of the farm that eventually became Ardencroft in 1950. The Craft Museum was also on the tour.  I helped letter a sign for the G'Arden, which was the final destination before everyone went inside the Buzz for a lovely reception featuring Beverley Flemming's wonderful tea sandwiches. After the long walk (this was on top of the five mile hike we did earlier in the day, I couldn't keep away from the chicken salad.

I am still learning about the founding and design of this town, discovering its influences which include the socialism of William Morris's Arts and Craft's Movement and the open, public spaces of Central Park designer Frederick Olmsted. I hope that I can document some of what I uncover in this blog, because it really is a fascinating glimpse into a very specific slice of American history. What happened in the building of Arden is a result of what was going on here and in the world in 1900. As an Art History minor, I am fascinated by these artifacts. As a writer I am inspired by the stories.

A Thesis on Utopia

 This photo comes from the 1993 Masters of Science thesis in historic preservation by University of Pennsylvania student Eliza Harvey Edwards entitled Arden: The Architecture and Planning of a Delaware Utopia. I am finding fascinating reading and am posting this photo and the link to the thesis for anyone else who may be interested. Enjoy!

The Sectional Requirement

We had lived in Arden for four months when it dawned on us that we had been inside more of our neighbors houses here than we had living in eighteen years in our previous zip code. I imagine that the open door policy in the Ardens stems from its inception as a summer community, when kids went in and out of one another's cottages,  slamming wooden screen doors and not caring that they just let in three winged creatures.  In Arden, we are used to bringing the outdoors inside and vice versa. What is a door, really? Arden's tagline is You Are Welcome Hither, and the Ardenites I have encountered take the welcoming very seriously.

As a result of all this hospitality, I have been privy to a lot of home interiors. And I love it. Mark and I used to go on the Lancaster County Parade of Homes all the time as young newlyweds. It is how we came across our home in Reinholds. We stopped going on the Parade of Homes because all the houses started to look alike. All that French Colonial outside with open floor plans and beige as far as the eye could see on the inside. Not so in Arden where no two houses are built alike. Even individual houses have a hard time figuring out what style they want to be. Our next door neighbors live in a 100-year-old craftsman cabin onto which they built a large Southern Louisiana, Creole style addition. It works. Arden does have its fair share of craftsman era and tudor revival cottages that were favored by the founders of Arden (an architect and a sculptor), but those influences in the town aren't oppressive. It would be interesting to count the influence of style on houses in Arden. And the colors? Pick one. We'll find a house that represents the hue.

One similarity that I have noticed in Arden houses is that no matter what size or shape the living or dining room, people make the most as far as seating options. I don't think I've ever seen so many sectionals in one community (But take that with a grain of salt as you know I haven't been in many houses within the communities I have inhabited. Just new, empty ones with beige, wall-to-wall carpeting.) I have never been a fan of the sectional until I moved here. As a piece of furniture they are clunky and territorial--taking over all the prime real estate within a house. Like suburban sprawl in a cornfield or man-splay on a subway.

Before long, however, people started inviting us to movie nights, and I began to see how many people you could seat comfortably. Soon, I began to look at our living room and wondering how we, too, could seat more of our friends and neighbors around our big screen. I started going on Houzz.com and entering sectional into the search engine. This wasn't just the stuff of man caves. I get it now.

Just yesterday, the men delivered our sectional. We had to take out a row of cabinets to accommodate it. But what is a game cabinet if you can't have friends over to play games? We will find another space for our things. This is the way of it. I call it the welcome hither style of decorating. You can be as eclectic and funky as you want as long as you can seat eight.  We still have some things to do to complete the look in our new and improved living room. I will post photos when it is complete. Might it be done in time for the Mad Men finale? I hope so. In the meantime, I think I will go to the grocery store and load up on popcorn.