During her mother’s illness in June 1956, Peggie Phipps Boegner confronted the possibility that the Long Island estate where she had grown up could be lost. That realization became the beginning of Old Westbury Gardens.

1906Mansion completed
1959Opened to visitors
200Acres preserved today

The institution’s history describes Boegner recognizing that the estate’s beauty and the family life attached to it might disappear. With encouragement from her husband and support from her brothers, she helped establish a public future for the property. Old Westbury Gardens officially opened to visitors in 1959.[1]

The preservation decision came well before the estate’s federal record. The National Park Service gives November 8, 1976—exactly 50 years before this feature—as the publication date for its National Register record.[3]

Front elevation of the red-brick Old Westbury mansion with a columned entrance and dormer windows
The Charles II-style mansion was completed in 1906. Gryffindor, CC BY-SA 3.0.

The mansion and gardens began as one project

John S. “Jay” Phipps was the eldest son of Henry Phipps Jr., a partner in Carnegie Steel. Jay married Margarita “Dita” Grace of the Grace shipping family. In 1904, Jay approved English designer George A. Crawley’s plans for a new Long Island residence.[1]

The official narrative says Jay had recently purchased 175 acres when planning began in 1904. Construction, roads, allées, and formal gardens advanced together. The current institution describes the result as a Charles II-style mansion completed by Crawley in 1906, now surrounded by 200 acres of formal gardens, landscape, woodland, ponds, and lakes.[1][2]

A clipped green allée forming a long axis toward the Old Westbury mansion
Clipped planting turns the garden into a sequence of long, controlled views. Gryffindor, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Formal reflecting pool aligned with terraces and planting at Old Westbury Gardens
The reflecting pool extends the estate’s architecture into the landscape. Gryffindor, CC BY-SA 3.0.

A family estate became a complete world

Jay, Dita, and their first three children moved into the mansion in March 1907. The estate history records ponies, polo fields, sports, family parties, and a miniature thatched cottage created for their daughter.[1]

Those details matter because Boegner was not preserving an isolated architectural object. She was trying to retain the setting where the family’s private life, recreation, landscape, rooms, collections, and routines had operated together.

Lily pool beside a pale garden colonnade at Old Westbury Gardens
A colonnade and lily pool give the gardens distinct architectural rooms. Gryffindor, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Side elevation of the Old Westbury mansion with tall arched windows and a long lawn
The side elevation opens through tall arched windows toward the lawn. Gryffindor, CC BY-SA 3.0.

The rooms preserved more than a floor plan

Old Westbury’s significance also rests inside. The institution says the mansion retains English antiques and decorative arts accumulated during more than 50 years of family occupancy.[2] Public-domain photographs made in 1961 show furnished rooms rather than empty architectural shells.

Black-and-white 1961 bedroom interior with a canopied bed, patterned walls, drapery, mirrors, and chairs
A canopied bed, patterned walls, drapery, mirrors, and movable furniture filled a bedroom in 1961. Samuel H. Gottscho / Library of Congress, public domain.
Black-and-white 1961 interior with a fireplace, carved mirror, central cabinet, chandelier, chairs, and a large armoire
A carved mirror, fireplace, central cabinet, chandelier, seating, and a large armoire document the furnished interior in 1961. Samuel H. Gottscho / Library of Congress, public domain.

The National Park Service record identifies architecture and landscape architecture as the estate’s areas of significance, names Crawley as architect, and gives 1906 as a significant year.[3] The record formalized values that the family had already chosen to protect through public access.

Preservation began with a personal refusal

After Jay and Dita died, Boegner, her husband, and her brothers established a public future for the estate. Old Westbury Gardens opened to visitors in 1959, seventeen years before the National Park Service record was published.

Fifty years after that federal record, the mansion, gardens, collection, and family history remain together. National recognition documented an estate the family had already chosen to preserve.

Sources and further reading

  1. Old Westbury Gardens — official family, construction, estate-life, preservation, and 1959 public-opening history
  2. Old Westbury Gardens — official architectural summary, 200-acre landscape, interiors, collections, and preservation mission
  3. National Park Service — National Register record metadata, publication date, architect, significance, period, and significant year

The published photographs are a property-specific editorial selection from Wikimedia Commons. Individual creators and licenses are identified in captions; the 1961 Library of Congress interiors are public domain. Source links and attribution are retained.