King's Garden at Fort Ticonderoga
Ticonderoga, New York
On the shores of Lake Champlain, N.Y., The King’s Garden at Fort Ticonderoga is one of the oldest formal gardens in the United States. The eighteenth-century Fort housed French and later British soldiers during the French and Indian and Revolutionary Wars. During this time, the garden was a garrison plot used to feed soldiers. In the early 1900s, a design and planting plan made modifications to the Fort’s existing garden, and the garden was named ‘Le Jardin du Roi’ or The King's Garden. The formal garden is surrounded by 9-foot-high brick walls with a pavilion in one corner and a two-story teahouse at the opposite end.

Over eighty years, the garden became overgrown, and the brick walls surrounding it eroded due to the harsh northern winters, causing bricks to crack and fall. While the plantings were being restored, RBA assisted the Fort with restoring the garden walls and teahouse. RBA reused all of the original brick and utilized a process of mortar replication to repair the original walls built in 1911. Historical photographs and magazine articles were also consulted to restore the walls and teahouse. Masonry reconstruction, restoration of the garden walls and teahouse, and restoration of the garden were funded by individuals, private foundations, and state programs.

The restoration of the garden has earned regional and national recognition. The King’s Garden received the Certificate of Commendation from the American Association for State and Local History and the Award for Excellence for Historic Preservation from the Preservation League of New York State.

RBA has had an ongoing relationship with Fort Ticonderoga since 1987 with numerous studies and projects at the King’s Garden, Pavilion, Fort, and Thompson-Pell Research Center.