Garfield Park

Garfield Park is a 184.72-acre public park on Chicago's West Side, one of three pleasure grounds planned in 1869 and built by the West Park Commission from 1871. William Le Baron Jenney laid out the first section as a naturalistic landscape, using a large lagoon to drain the flat, clay prairie site. Oscar F. Dubuis completed much of the central and western areas in the 1880s. From 1905, Jens Jensen reworked the park as part of his experiments with Prairie style landscape design, adding a formal flower garden and a conservatory. Surviving structures include Jenney's 1874 suspension bridge, rebuilt in 1936, an 1890 stable, and an 1896 power house and octagonal marble bandstand by Joseph L. Silsbee. Work from the 1920s and the Works Progress Administration adds further layers, including an administration building and an Art Deco bridge. The park was listed for its designers, its landscape and its retained historic features despite some losses and alterations.