LGP 2024-2025 Biennial Report-digital - Flipbook - Page 40
THE ART OF STEWARDSHIP
Eileen Rockefeller Growald’s $1 million gi strengthens cultural legacy.
When Eileen Rockefeller Growald talks about the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden, she speaks not only as a former board director of the Preserve, but as someone whose life has been shaped by it. Her memories stretch back
to childhood, when the garden felt sacred, governed by the exacting standards for beauty of her mother, Peggy
Rockefeller, and imbued with an energy that was felt long before it could be named. It was the place where she
knew, at just ten years old, that she wanted to be married. Decades later, it remains the place where she and her
husband Paul return year aer year to mark their wedding anniversary.
For much of her life, the garden was something deeply
personal, part of her family’s private world and inherited responsibility. Over time, Eileen’s understanding of
the garden has evolved. In a recent conversation with
Preserve CEO Patrick MacRae, she describes a shi that
mirrors the Preserve’s own transformation: from seeing
the garden primarily as something to be maintained, to
understanding it as a cultural work of art that must be
actively stewarded for the public good.
That shi, Eileen explains, was sparked by a growing
recognition that beauty, history, and meaning cannot “This garden asks . . . for stewardship—care guided by
be preserved by routine care alone. Gardens change. knowledge, intention, and respect for what came before.”
Sculptures weather. Trees mature, decline, and sometimes disappear. Without careful documentation and informed decision-making, the essence of a place can quietly
erode. The introduction of Cultural Landscape Reports—comprehensive documents that record a garden’s history, design intent, and physical condition—opened a new way of thinking. These reports provide a foundation for
future choices, ensuring that decisions about what to restore, protect, or adapt are grounded in knowledge rather
than intuition alone.
