{"nrhp_refnum":"88002234","name":"Shakespeare Garden","other_names":[],"category":"site","location":{"address":"Northwestern University campus","address_restricted":false,"city":"Evanston","county":"Cook County","state":"IL","lat":42.05682867200005,"lon":-87.67609991099994,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1988-11-16","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Landscape Architecture","Social History"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A formal Elizabethan-style garden measuring 70 by 120 feet on the Northwestern University campus in Evanston, Cook County, Illinois. Jens Jensen designed it in 1915, and the Garden Club of Evanston laid it out from 1916 and completed it by 1929.","why_significant":"The garden is tied to the social movement to commemorate Shakespeare on the 300th anniversary of his death, which was promoted by the Drama League of America. It is also the work of Jens Jensen, a master of Prairie style landscape design. Here he made an unusual departure from his own style, producing a formal, straight-lined garden that copied a historical English type.","narrative":"Tucked between the Garrett Theological Seminary and the former Patten Gymnasium site on Northwestern University's Evanston campus, this small garden is a walled-in outdoor room of hawthorn hedges. Landscape architect Jens Jensen conceived it in 1915 as a Shakespeare Garden, answering a Drama League of America call to mark the 300th anniversary of the playwright's death. The Garden Club of Evanston carried out the plan from 1916, with planting finished by 1920. Eight flower beds flank a central lawn, and four of them are knot gardens edged in boxwood. A curved stone bench sits at the west end. At the east end is a fountain and memorial designed by the Burnham Brothers, with a bronze Shakespeare plaque by Leon Hermant. Though formal, the garden carries Jensen's signatures, including hawthorns, flagstone paths and a surrounding forest border. It is notable as an unusual departure from his Prairie style and as a commemorative landscape of its era.","period_of_significance":"1916-1929","architect_builder":"Jens Jensen; Burnham Brothers","architectural_style":null,"criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Described as in superb condition and carefully maintained by the Garden Club of Evanston, which devotes about 400-500 hours a year to its care; it won an Evanston Preservation Award for maintenance in 1985.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:35.444012-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/37/8926/28892637/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_IL/88002234.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/88002234/66fb796a1c-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/88002234/66fb796a1c-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Zol87 from Chicago, IL, USA","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shakespeare_Garden_(Evanston).jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Zol87 from Chicago, IL, USA</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shakespeare_Garden_(Evanston).jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/28892637","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare_Garden_(Evanston,_Illinois)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q14688082"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/illinois/cook-county/shakespeare-garden-88002234/"}