Fairsted: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site
Beagan C. 2025. Fairsted: Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 650028. National Park Service. NPS Northeast Regional Office, Boston, Massachusetts / CRIS-CL Database
Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site (NHS), also known as Fairsted, is a 7.06-acre property located in the Green Hill area of Brookline, Massachusetts that preserves the final home and office of landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted Sr. (1822–1903) and the offices of the successor firms that operated from the site until 1979, the year the park was established. The National Park Service acquired the property in 1980. Until its dedication, Fairsted functioned as both a place of work and residence, first for the Olmsted family, later housing members of the firm, and intermittently as a rental property, all the while functioning as a landscape architecture office. The site is located in the Green Hill residential neighborhood at 99 Warren Street, on the west side of the street. Spruce pole fencing demarcates the lot on the north, east, and west sides, while a dry stone wall separates the property from the adjoining National Park Service-owned site to the south. A chain-link fence with wood posts marks the boundary between the site and the neighboring property to the southwest. Fairsted consists of the 1810 Federal style farmhouse, office wing, and outbuildings in addition to the designed landscape. The 7.06-acre site includes the 5.31-acre property to the south of the dwelling, which National Park Service acquired in 2001. In its present form, the property is characterized by features from the Olmsted Sr. era of ownership (1883–1903), with alterations and additions made in the subsequent years of operation by the Olmsted Brothers firm. The park has restored the site to its appearance at the height of the firm’s operation, c.1930, through removal of later additions to the landscape and replacement of missing landscape features.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Beagan, Chris
- Date of Issue
- 2025
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- FRLA
- Keywords
- (Joshua) Clark House, Archeology-Historic-Non-Aboriginal, Community Planning and Development, Conservation of Natural Resources, Designed Landscape, Exhibit, Expressing Cultural Values, Fairsted, Formation Of The Conservation Movement 1870-1908, Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site, Historic Site, Interpretive Landscape, Landscape Architecture, Leisure-Passive (Park), Origins Of The National Parks Movement, Parks Produce A New Profession, Professional, Research Facility (Laboratory), Single Family House, Transforming the Environment, Urban Planning In The Nineteenth Century, Urban Planning in the Twentieth Century