Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens in Virginia

3 November 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Museums, Exhibitions, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  9 minutes

Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens seen from the Potomac river © flickr.com - Personnel of the NOAA Ship THOMAS JEFFERSON

Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens seen from the Potomac river © flickr.com – Personnel of the NOAA Ship THOMAS JEFFERSON

Mount Vernon, located near Alexandria, Fairfax County, Virginia, was the plantation home of the first President of the United States, George Washington (* February 22, 1732 on Pope’s Creek Estate near present-day Colonial Beach in Westmoreland County, Virginia. ; † December 14, 1799 on Mount Vernon Estate). The mansion is built of wood in neoclassical Georgian architectural style, and the estate is located on the banks of the Potomac River. The property consists of 500 acres (2.0 km2), with the main buildings, including the house, located near the riverfront. Mount Vernon was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1960 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is owned and maintained in trust by The Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association and is open every day of the year.   read more…

The Dessau-Wörlitz Garden Realm (English Grounds of Wörlitz) in Saxony-Anhalt

27 October 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  6 minutes

Wörlitz - Rock island Stein and Villa Hamilton © Matthias Seifert

Wörlitz – Rock island Stein and Villa Hamilton © Matthias Seifert

The DessauWörlitz Garden Realm, also known as the English Grounds of Wörlitz, is one of the first and largest English parks in Germany and continental Europe. It was created in the late 18th century under the regency of Duke Leopold III of Anhalt-Dessau (1740-1817), returning from a Grand Tour to Italy, the Netherlands, England, France and Switzerland he had undertaken together with his friend architect Friedrich Wilhelm von Erdmannsdorff. Both strongly influenced by the ideals of The Enlightenment, they aimed to overcome the formal garden concept of the Baroque era in favour of a naturalistic landscape as they had seen at Stourhead Gardens and Ermenonville. Today the cultural landscape of Dessau-Wörlitz encompasses an area of 142 km2 (55 sq mi) within the Middle Elbe Biosphere Reserve in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt.   read more…

Parks and Gardens

17 October 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, Environment Reading Time:  8 minutes

Hannover - Great Garden in Herrenhausen Gardens © Arabsalam

Hannover – Great Garden in Herrenhausen Gardens © Arabsalam

A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the display, cultivation, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature. The garden can incorporate both natural and man-made materials. The most common form today is known as a residential garden, but the term garden has traditionally been a more general one. Zoos, which display wild animals in simulated natural habitats, were formerly called zoological gardens. Western gardens are almost universally based on plants, with garden often signifying a shortened form of botanical garden.   read more…

The Kinema in the Woods and Petwood House

12 September 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Hotels, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  5 minutes

Kinema in the Woods © geograph.org.uk/Rodney Burton

Kinema in the Woods © geograph.org.uk/Rodney Burton

The Kinema in the Woods is a cinema in the village of Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire. It dates from 1922, and it is the only fully functioning cinema in the UK to employ back projection.   read more…

Oestrich-Winkel in the Rheingau

10 September 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  5 minutes

Vinyards and Vollrads Castle © Brühl

Vinyards and Vollrads Castle © Brühl

Oestrich-Winkel is a town in the Rheingau-Taunus district in the Darmstadt region in Hesse and is characterized by winegrowing. The Rheingau Music Festival has its office in Oestrich in a former winery, the presshouse (Kelterhalle) converted to a hall for intimitate concerts and events.   read more…

Castel Gandolfo, the summer residence of the popes

5 September 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  7 minutes

Castel Gandolfo © Deblu68

Castel Gandolfo © Deblu68

Castel Gandolfo is a small Italian town or comune in Lazio that occupies a height overlooking Lake Albano about 15 miles south-east of Rome, on the Alban Hills. It is best known as the summer residence of the Pope. It is an Italian town with the population of 8834. The town was voted one of the most beautiful towns in Italy.   read more…

The Irish Glenveagh National Park

25 August 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  5 minutes

Glenveagh National Park © flickr.com - Michal Osmenda

Glenveagh National Park © flickr.com – Michal Osmenda

Glenveagh is the second largest national park in Ireland. The park covers 170 square kilometres of hillside above Glenveagh Castle on the shore of Lough Veagh, 20 km from Gweedore in County Donegal. The network of mainly informal gardens displays a multitude of exotic and delicate plants from as far afield as Chile, Madeira and Tasmania, all sheltered by windbreaks of pine trees and ornamental rhododendrons.   read more…

The Hamptons on Long Island

8 August 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  5 minutes

Southampton - National Golf Links of America clubhouse © Americasroof

Southampton - National Golf Links of America clubhouse © Americasroof

The Hamptons may refer to several villages and hamlets in the towns of Southampton and East Hampton on the far east end of Suffolk County on Long Island, New York. These townships occupy the South Fork of Long Island, stretching into the Atlantic Ocean. The Hamptons form a popular seaside resort, one of the historical Summer Colonies of the American Northeast. They have some of the most expensive residential properties in the U.S.   read more…

The Olympic Park in London

1 August 2012 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month, London, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks, Sport Reading Time:  2 minutes

Olympic Park London - April 2012 © flickr.com - EG Focus / Anthony Charlton

Olympic Park London – April 2012 © flickr.com – EG Focus / Anthony Charlton

The Olympic Park in London is a sporting complex under construction for the 2012 Summer Olympics and the 2012 Summer Paralympics, situated to the east of the city adjacent to the Stratford City development. It will contain the athletes’ Olympic Village and several of the sporting venues including the Olympic Stadium and Aquatics Centre. The park will be overlooked by ArcelorMittal Orbit, an observation tower and Britain’s largest piece of public art. After the Olympics, the park is to be known as Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II, though it will not be an official Royal Park of London. (PDF-Download London 2012 Olympic Park map)   read more…

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