Sunken Garden

Alfred I. du Pont's son, Alfred Victor, studied architecture at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he met Gabriel Massena, a dynamic young Frenchman. Together they formed Massena and du Pont (the former being the design partner) and returned to the United States—before Alfred had quite completed his training—in order to execute a plum commission, a Sunken Garden at Nemours. The idea for such a garden had come about in the late 1920s while A. I. and his son vacationed in Karlsbad. A. I. had paid Thomas Hastings (of Carrère and Hastings) $10,000 for a design just before Hastings's sudden death in 1929—by which time A. I. had already given the project to his son. The Sunken Garden, with its splashing fountains and rich carving, would be the showpiece by which Massena and du Pont hoped to gain fame. The expensive Roman travertine was novel in the United States, its weathering properties uncertain. Construction was undertaken by Stewart and Donohue of Wilmington. Massena at first called for seashells in the grottolike niches beneath the curving stairs but later changed these to pebbles. Gleaming-white sculptures of frolicking putti by a Paris master of Art Deco, Carlo Sarrabezolles, are unique examples of his work in the United States. Extensive publicity photographs were taken, including aerial views, but these put father and son at cross purposes, as A. I. did not want Nemours to be featured in “society” magazines, especially alongside the gardens of his hated cousin, Pierre, or of John J. Raskob (see Archmere, BR4). Nemours was, however, featured in Fortune magazine (November 1934). Last in the huge garden complex came the round-roofed Ionic tholos called the Temple of Love, initially designed by Hastings in 1923 and which A. I. wanted to resemble as nearly as possible that at the Petit Trianon at Versailles, although it was ultimately modified. A bronze copy of Jean-Antoine Houdon's famous Diana was installed in 1934.