Sunday Afternoon Tea at the Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens
Washington, DC is peppered with large estates hidden behind tall walls and formidable iron gates but not all require a formal invitation for access. Fortunately, Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens opens it gates to the rest of us. Home of Post Cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post, her mansion is located in a residential neighborhood in NW Washington DC and sits on 25 beautiful acres with 13 acres of formal gardens and a working greenhouse.
Mrs. Post purchased the Hillwood estate in 1955 to reside in and to house her extensive collection with the plan of converting it to a museum in the future. An avowed collector of Russian art, her collection includes Russian icons, textiles, porcelain and silver and includes a Catherine the Great Easter Fabergé egg. In all, her mansion houses more than 16,000 objects.
Her home is surrounded by pleasure gardens designed by several noteworthy architects during her time. Conceived as outdoor “rooms,” each garden is it’s own unique and private world connected to each other through subtle transitional features. The Japanese-style garden is perhaps the most breathtaking – designed as a miniature mountain complete with a cascading stream, rocky mountainside and a lake with a bridge at the bottom. The amazing detail reflected in this outdoor space will leave you in a daze of wonder and awe.
If, after walking the gardens, you are feeling a bit “peckish,” then you can wander over to the Hillwood Café. On Sundays from 1:00 PM to 3:30 PM they offer Afternoon Tea where you can choose from many delightful choices, finger sandwiches and miniature pastries – a great way to end a perfectly dignified stroll through an elegant estate.
Hillwood (and the Café) is open Tuesday through Saturday and offers a docent-led, audio or printed tour to suit your preferred pace. So don’t miss your chance to see how the other half of DC lives!
What: Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens
Where: 4155 Linnean Avenue NW | Washington, DC
Contact: Tel 202-686-5807
Website: http://www.hillwoodmuseum.org/
Image via Flickr (creative commons) by Anosmia
Category: THINGS TO DO IN AND AROUND DC
[...] Social. On Saturday, June 4, guests will don their best seersucker and ride their bicycles to Hillwood Estates for an afternoon of tea, badminton, and croquet. You may tour the mansion, enjoy a picnic on the [...]