Planting Fields is a magnificent Gold Coast estate from the 1920s, which survives today as a statement about art, architecture, and landscape. Located in Oyster Bay, New York and originally landscaped by the Olmsted Brothers, the grounds feature 409 acres of greenhouses, rolling lawns, formal gardens, woodland paths and outstanding plant collections. Planting Fields is one of only a few surviving estates on Long Island with its original acreage intact, as well as its buildings, including Coe Hall, a 65-room Tudor Revival mansion designed by architects Alexander Walker and Leon Gillette. It was created beginning in 1913 by William Robertson Coe and his second wife, Mai Rogers Coe, heiress and daughter of Standard Oil partner Henry Huttleston Rogers. Born in England into modest circumstances, W.R. Coe made his fortune in the U.S. as chairman of a large marine insurance company. The interior of the house is a showcase of artistry and craftsmanship and features a distinctly American aesthetic through original ironwork commissions by Samuel Yellin and murals painted by artists Robert Winthrop Chanler and Everett Shinn. Nearly a thousand such estates were built after the Civil War through about 1940, making this area the largest concentration of large estates anywhere in the U.S. Just under 60% of them survive today; about 400 are in residential use, most on reduced size lots. Planting Fields was one of the last of these estates to be created.
Together, W.R. and Mai Coe commissioned their country home, Coe Hall (1918-1921), to resemble a 400-year-old English manor, along with two greenhouses, a large hay barn with stables and a landscape designed by the Olmsted Brothers, sons of Frederick Law Olmsted. Alexander Walker and Leon Gillette were one of more than 200 architectural firms who designed large houses on Long Island during the Gold Coast era. Walker and Gillette envisioned a comprehensive estate, which combined the built and natural world, relying on the landscape design to unify efforts. In the fall of 1918, ground was broken for Coe Hall after a fire that spring had destroyed the previous mansion by Grosvenor Atterbury with landscape work by James Greenleaf. The new house on the same site integrated some of Greenleaf’s earlier garden features, notably the circular pool just south of Coe Hall. The house was constructed by the Cauldwell-Wingate Company, founded in New York City in 1910.
Planting Fields is included in the National Register of Historic Places.
Planting Fields Foundation strives to preserve and make relevant to all audiences the heritage of Planting Fields, an early 20th century 409-acre estate, designed as an integrated composition of the built and natural world.
The Main Greenhouse includes tropical plants, succulents, and more. The Camellia House (greenhouse) is the largest camellia collection under glass in the Northeast. See https://plantingfields.org/landscape/ for more information.
Tours of Coe Hall available Wednesday through Sunday. Guided tours are available from 10:00am to 3:00pm Wednesday through Friday and 10:00am to 1:00pm Saturday and Sunday. Self-guided tours from 2:00pm to 4:00pm on Saturdays and Sundays.
