Sonnenberg House and Gardens

 The Sonnenberg Mansion in Canandaigua is a 40-room house built in the late 1800s in the Queen Anne style. This house is a little older and smaller than the Stan Hywet mansion we visited in 2016. Sonnenberg means "sunny hill." It was not the name of the owner. This was the summer home of Frederick Thompson, a New York City banker. His wife Mary was the governor's daughter.

The Conservatory is the oldest working wooden greenhouse in the northeast, and it is the oldest in the United States that has not been modified. It's considered one of the finest privately owned greenhouses. The estate is now operated as a non-profit arm of the NY Parks and Recreation Department, but the greenhouses were originally private.

The estate was opened to the public in 1973, but a lot of repairs and restoration have been ongoing since that time. A number of the gardens could have used a lot of attention, but it was still worth the visit. This is the formal Italian Garden. The view was the best from an upstairs porch of the house because you could see the fleur-de-lis design of the plantings.

The Moonlight Garden featured all white flowers. Many were supposed to be fragrant. This is Casa Blanca lily.

The Old Fashioned Garden used a popular 17th Century design. There were boxwood hedges with perennial beds inside and a long pergola down the middle.

I think they are saving money on the plants and putting the fund toward restoration. Most of the plants were things you could commonly buy at a good greenhouse. I guess that's OK for now. There were a couple I did not know. This is Macedonian Scabious, Knautia macedonia. Japanese anemone was in bud, but none were open. I don't think I've seen that before either.

My favorite garden was the Rock Garden, although there is still a lot of repair work to do. First of all, this is hugely different from my rock garden. Tons of rock were hauled in to make a miniature canyon and streams. They are currently raising money to restore the water circulation system so the 500 feet of streams and pools will function. And it's big- at least an acre. This is part of the constructed "canyon." You could walk a gentle incline through the middle or go up the stairs to the right.

The central path went under this arch, then climbed and curved around to cross the top of the arch as a bridge.

At the top, there was one more level of an observation deck. It was shaded by a plant that was actually planted for the original estate. This is a climbing hydrangea, Hydrangea anomala, native to Asia. It's over 85 years old. The bark peels like sycamore. This was also new to me.

I guess if you want more pictures from Sonnenberg you'll have to hope I have a "slow news day" in the near future. This is about enough for now.

But I'll show you one orchid from the conservatory. They had a tropical room, a desert room, and orchid room, and a couple more. There was a recording playing with info, but I didn't catch all that it said. Anyway, this is Brassia arachnoidea, one of the spider orchids.

When I say "we" went to the garden... Marie and I, Marie's brothers and their wives, Melanie, and Ruth and Dan all went. It was quite a production. But I spent a fair amount of the day on my own so I could take all the pictures I wanted and read the signs.

The house was open too. I got a few pictures of the interior.

Tonight, we are at Larry and Pam's house. Working our way east.

See Stan Hywet