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Charles Gillette

{{short description|American architect}}

{{Infobox architect

|name = Charles Gillette

|image =

|image_size =

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|nationality = American

|birth_date = March 14, 1886

|birth_place = Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin

|death_date = March 30, 1969

|death_place = Richmond, Virginia

|spouse = {{Marriage|Ellen Patterson Cogwell|1912|1967|end=died}}

|practice =

|significant_buildings=

|significant_projects = University of Richmond, Reynolds Metals Company International Headquarters

|significant_design =

|awards =

}}

Charles Freeman Gillette (March 14, 1886 – March 30, 1969) was a prominent landscape architect in the upper South who specialized in the creation of grounds supporting Colonial Revival architecture, particularly in Richmond, Virginia. He is associated with the restoration and re-creation of historic gardens in the upper South and especially Virginia. He is known for having established a regional style—known as the "Virginia Garden."

Biography

File:"York Hall," Captain George Preston Blow house, Route 1005 and Main Street, Yorktown, York County, Virginia. Guest house in Memory Garden.jpg

Charles F. Gillette was born in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin in 1886 as the tenth and last child of Orlando Gillette and Catherine Gillette (nee Melville). His father served as a private in the 30th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment in the Union Army during the Civil War. Due to his family's financial state, Gillette never had any formal schooling.

In 1909–1911, Gillette served as an apprentice in the Boston office of Warren H. Manning, a leading early-20th century landscape architect. Gillette moved to Richmond in 1913 to supervise the completion of Manning's landscape design for the University of Richmond's new campus. In 1915, he began designing the grounds of the Nelson House in Yorktown, Virginia. In 1924, he commenced work on the landscape restoration of Kenmore in Fredericksburg, Virginia. A few years later, he initiated plans for the landscaping of Virginia House and Agecroft, both reconstructed English manor houses located in Richmond's Windsor Farms neighborhood. Extensive additions to the Virginia House gardens were completed in 1939. During the 1950s, Gillette redesigned the gardens of Virginia's Executive Mansion at the request of Governor Thomas B. Stanley. In 1958, he designed the grounds for the Reynolds Metals Company International Headquarters located at Richmond. His commissions also included hundreds of residential projects throughout Virginia and North Carolina.[http://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/guides/opac/gilletteabout.htm Library of Virginia: About the Charles F. Gillette Photograph Collection]

A number of his works were designed for properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places.{{NRISref|version=2010a}}

In popular culture

Author Tom Wolfe references Gillette as the commissioned landscaper of Dupont University in I Am Charlotte Simmons.

Selected works

References

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External links

  • [http://tclf.org/pioneer/charles-gillette The Cultural Landscape Foundation: Charles Freeman Gillette]
  • [http://gardenandgun.com/article/gillettes-gem Garden and Gun: "Gillette's Gem"]

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Category:American landscape architects

Category:Architects from Richmond, Virginia

Category:1886 births

Category:1969 deaths

Category:Preservationist architects

Category:People from Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin

Category:20th-century American architects

Category:Architects from Wisconsin