The Project
OLIN’s design retains key features of the original design while making essential renovations and upgrades. The scope of the project includes: Interior Courtyard Garden- Interior garden regrading, including enhanced accessibility for all pathways
- Repair and restoration of garden walls, stairs
- Replacement and restoration of all bluestone and stone fine paving
- Selective removal and pruning of shrubs outside
- Planting of trees, shrubs and perennials within the garden
- A new water-efficient irrigation system for all new planting
- New garden lighting
- Restoration of all exterior lawn areas
- Installation of service stairs, walls and curbs, exterior pathways
- Installation of rear drive accessible entry and retaining wall
- Planting trees, shrubs and groundcover between perimeter iron fence and exterior paths
- Planting buffering trees along rear drive, including a row of Liberty American elms
- Water-efficient irrigation for all new plantings
- Restoration of Meudon Gate and terrace
- New and accessible pathways, integrating the garden, exterior landscape and improving connection to Parkway sidewalks
- Selective pruning of existing canopy trees
- Selective planting of new canopy trees
- Parkway enhancements, including improved drainage between 21st and 22nd Streets
- New benches and receptacles along Parkway sidewalk at front entry
- Planting of flowering shrubs and groundcover at front entry
- Replacement of declining trees along Parkway between 21st and 22nd Streets and at front entry
Meudon Gate
As an integral part of the garden and landscape rejuvenation project, the stone entrance to the Rodin Museum, known as the Meudon Gate, is also being restored. The gate— modeled after the 18th-century façade at Château d’Issy, which Rodin had installed at his property at Meudon, France—is a significant feature both on the grounds and as viewed from the Parkway. It is now being cleaned to remove the vehicular grime and pollution that has accumulated during the past 80 years. It is being re-pointed and its stone repaired where necessary, and its large French wrought-iron gates, fashioned in Paris in 1926-7 after a circa 1700 model, are being cleaned, restored, and coated as well. Two flights of limestone steps leading to the museum entrance are also being replaced using new stone quarried in France. Improvements include:- Stone façade cleaning and repair
- Historic metalwork conservation and restoration
- Plumbing and electrical repair
- Roof repair
- Repair and replacement of terrace paving and stone steps
Planting Plan
A new planting plan for the interior courtyard garden and the areas surrounding the Museum are being implemented in close coordination with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. The plan for the outer areas creates a vista to spotlight the courtyard and museum building from the Parkway, with plantings that include native species used in the original design: fragrant viburnum, honeysuckle, sweetshrub, summersweet, American beautyberry, sparkleberry holly, fothergilla, oak leaf hydrangea, and winter-blooming witch hazel. Above this shrub layer will be a low canopy of flowering trees: saucer magnolias, serviceberry, white fringe tree, silver bell, and redbud. Within the interior courtyard, a formal perennial garden will offer rose, day lily, iris, liatris, red-hot poker, and winter blooming hellebore with a wide variety of fragrance and seasonal display. Color, texture and variety of plants, changing throughout the seasons, will contribute to draw the visitor into the gardens year-round.The Thinker
One of Auguste Rodin’s most famous sculptures and a prominent feature of the Rodin Museum, The Thinker, has been transported to the Philadelphia Museum of Art for safekeeping during the initial phase of renovations. This world-famous masterpiece will be on display in the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Great Stair Hall until it can be safely reinstalled at the Rodin Museum.The Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Coinciding with the Rodin Museum garden and landscape renovations, the north and south sides of the Parkway streetscape between 21st Street and Eakins Oval are being enhanced through pedestrian, bicycle, and vehicular circulation improvements. Curb extensions, or “bump outs,” will minimize pedestrian crossing distances, and a widened central median will be created through strategic parking and traffic lane configurations. A clearly marked bicycle lane will be provided. Tour bus loading and unloading for the Rodin Museum will be accommodated on 22nd Street. New paving and furnishings will be installed based on Fairmount Park’s publication, The Benjamin Franklin Parkway Design Guidelines for Public Environs. Fairmount Park has retained Lager Raabe Skafte Landscape Architects, the author of the guidelines, as the designers for the Parkway streetscape improvements.Project Schedule
Construction is expected to be completed for the Meudon Gate restoration by fall 2009, while construction is expected to finish for the Rodin Museum garden and landscape and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway streetscape by fall 2010.For more information, please contact the Rodin Museum at (215) 568-6026.
