The Cloisters Medieval Garden

As I mentioned in an earlier post, there are no surviving European Medieval gardens, and little documentation about them. In New York City, we have The Cloisters, which is a composite of at least five different ancient European cloisters, on the banks of the Hudson in Fort Tryon Park. The Cloisters is part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and dedicated to the scholarly study of Medieval Europe.

Cloister refers to a covered walkway that surrounds a quadrangle, usually in a religious institution. Typically there is a wall on one side of the walkway, and a colonnade on the other opening into the quadrangle, which is frequently a garden. This cloister, or “closed place”, is the heart of the medieval European garden. The Cloisters includes three such gardens:

• The Cuxa Cloister and Gardens – consists of crossed paths and a central fountain, in which both medieval and modern plant species are grown.
• The Bonnefont Cloister and Garden – an herb garden that contains more than 250 plant species grown in the middle ages. Hardscaping elements include a central well head, raised beds, and wattle fences (woven of strips of willow or hazel).
• The Trie Cloister and Garden – a garden planted with medieval species that mimic the “millefleurs” background of tapestries, such as the Unicorn series that is housed at the Cloisters.

Learn more about The Cloisters, the medieval collection, and the gardens: http://youtu.be/tiYENYz_v4s 



John D. Rockefeller Jr. provided funds for the building and purchasing land for the Cloisters, as well as across the river, with the stipulation that it not be developed to keep the feeling of an ancient monastery. Building pieces were purchased in Europe from a variety of sources, and the architect Charles Collens incorporated them into a unified whole. The Cloisters houses the George Grey Barnard medieval collection. The Cloisters opened in 1938. Learn more: http://www.metmuseum.org/visit/visit-the-cloisters