Notes : Photographed by Harold Cazneaux
Everglades Gardens
A fierce bushfire, in 1910, destroyed the orchard and gardens that Mrs Stonier had established on this Leura hillside and which she had named Ever glades. The 13-acre property then remained derelict until 1932 when the Belgian-born and successful Sydney industrialist Henri Van der Velde and his wife Una bough it for their weekend retreat.
Around the same time Van der Velde, the head of the Feltex company, was introduced to Danish-born Paul Sorensen, who had trained as a nurseryman and landscape architect in Europe.
Having settled in the Blue Mountains in 1915, Sorensen, had quickly gained a reputation as a garden designer of unusual talent. Superb dry stone walls and a unique mix of exotic plantings with native flora were elements of his unmistakable signature (In his long career Sorensen was eventually acclaimed Australia's Master Gardener.)
Van der Velde commissioned Sorensen to design and supervise the construction of a series of gardens, with up to 40 men employed on the project during the depression years of 1933-35. It was a grand partnership between two visionaries. Sorensen was also commissioned to design the three-storey moderne style Everglades house, plus the Van der Velde's private squash court and swimming pool.
On October 11, 1936 the Van der Velders were so pleased with the progress that they opened Everglades Gardens to the public as a fund-raiser for the RSPCA. Leading design magazines of the day also prominently featured the house's avant garde elegance and extraordinary garden setting.
A few years after Henri Van der Velder's death in 1947, his widow sold the property, moving to a smaller house nearby.
Everglades Gardens passed through several ownerships until, in 1962, a group of benefactors purchased it for the National Trust. For a short time, in the mid '6os, Sorensen ! supervised restoration and renewal works on the property | for the Trust. Several different management partnerships were responsible for the historic property's care, until 1998 when the National Trust again assumed full management. Notes from Everglades Gardens, Leura brochure 2001
Format: signed B&W sepia toned photograph
Licensing: Attribution, share alike, creative commons
Repository: Blue Mountains City Library -
library.bmcc.nsw.gov.au/
Part of: Local Studies Collection LSQ 712.6 CAZ
Provenance: Donation
