field trip to asheville: mr. olmsted's biltmore and black mountain college

We already managed to celebrate one architect's birthday this week, why not another one?

​April 26 was Frederick Law Olmsted's birthday. So we are lighting 195 candles for the father of American landscape architecture on today's claass HAUS. (Plus, Black Mountain College!)

Due to completely unrelated events, I'll be celebrating FLO's birthday this weekend in Asheville, North Carolina, home of Mr. Olmsted's most famous residential commission and the crowning jewel of his long and productive career, the Biltmore. I won't waste your time (or mine) giving you a history of  FLO's expansive project for the Biltmore grounds (read about it here and here, if you're interested), but I did dig up a group of fascinating (mostly) historic photographs that offer a unique view  of Olmsted's Biltmore landscape.

While the Biltmore draws Asheville’s biggest crowds, the area is home to another icon of American art and architecture- Black Mountain College, a progressive educational facility centered on art as an indispensable part of the learning experience. A maverick institution, Black Mountain College attracted some of the finest minds of the twentieth century- Anni and Josef Albers, Buckminster Fuller, Willem and Elaine de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, John Cage, and Jacob Lawrence- just to name a few. I plan to write something more on this subject soon, but until then here are a few photographs from the school's glory days.

Hope you enjoyed this little glimpse of Asheville. Maybe I'll see you there this weekend.

Image at top of page- John Singer Sargent [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons​.