"CAUSMETT" GARDEN TOUR JUNE 23, 1927

The house seen from the air over the Sound looking across Lloyds Neck to Cold Spring Harbor. To the right of the house lies the formal garden with the rock garden below it. The roof of the tennis house can be seen at the left. The gamekeeper's house and kennels appear in the center background; the farm group is in the left background.

 THE extensive estate of Mr. and Mrs. Marshall Field at Lloyd's Neck, which comprises nearly 2,000 acres, has but one garden that might be described as formal. This will be shown on June 23. Many driveways traverse the parklike grounds, where native plants have been used in such manner that they seem to have been left there as nature intended. 

The main house is one of the best examples of Georgian architecture in America. The bricks were specially treated to give a pinkish buff hue.

The house is Georgian in style, with a setting of shrubs in which the kalmia predominates. 

LONG GARDEN, 1932
This area was designed by the famed landscape architecture firm founded by Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of Central Park, with substantial input from Evelyn Field, Marshall’s first wife. A walk through the Long Garden today offers just a hint of the former splendor of the garden. Several statues filled the niches in the brick wall that runs along the garden. In spring the apple trees in the garden bloom beautifully, and at the end of the Long Garden is the gate that leads to the never-completed terraced garden

LONG GARDEN, 1953
NOTE THE REMOVED WEST WING

LONG GARDEN, 1953

In the garden the beds with their many colored flowers are laid out in symmetrical design like carpets of rare workmanship on closely cropped lawns. 

ROCK GARDEN
The west end of the house seen from the rock garden set in the hillside below the house. To the right is the formal garden of shrubs and flowers. NOTE THE EXTANT WEST WING

A rock garden is approached by rough steps hewn from boulders that also lead to a rustic bridge. 

WINTER COTTAGE
Set at the head of a long valley, commanding a view of the entrance, the winter cottage is framed in a veritable bower of green, with little gardens and grass walks on every side. Great plantings of rhododendrons make a gorgeous color picture in mid-June. Landscape Architect was Marian Cruger Coffin. The Fields lived in the winter cottage during construction of the main house.

Another attraction of the estate is the Winter cottage of gray stone now surrounded by flowering shrubs. 

 The Sunken Garden was located at the end of the Long Garden. It was part of a planned set of garden terraces down to the beach. It was never completed.  

There is a sunken garden whose flowers are guarded against the strong winds from the water, a tennis court surrounded by flowers, and a drive that leads to a sandy beach.

Just west of the Main House is a beach access road. The area was blanketed with daffodil bulbs. 

Sir William Orpen, 1878–1931, Title - Evelyn Marshall Field (Mrs. Marshall Field III), Date ca. 1921.

The Fields were married in 1915. When this garden tour was held in 1927 it was probable that the couple were beginning to drift apart. Marshall traveled a great deal of the time and socialized assiduously. Evelyn felt the he was bored with the refined, bridge-party social life of sedate upper-class circles. He seemed to prefer a younger and more pleasure seeking crowd. They divorced in 1930.

Caumsett meant "place by sharp rock".

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The late John Foreman's BIG OLD HOUSES visits "Causmett".

The Caumsett Foundation.