Rockland County Courthouse and Dutch Gardens

Rockland County Courthouse and Dutch Gardens form a civic complex in New City, New York. The three-story courthouse, finished in 1928, is faced in Indiana limestone and follows the Art Deco style, with a flat roof, a symmetrical plan, and carved seals, wrought-iron flowers and bronze doors. Inside, a marble stair rises beneath a 1929 painted map of the county. The design by Dennison and Hirons won a competition and replaced an earlier brick courthouse that the growing county had outgrown. Beside it, Dutch Gardens was built between 1934 and 1936 and was designed by Mary Mowbray Clarke. Formal flower beds, serpentine brick walls, a tea house, bandstand, arbor and gazebo evoke the county's Dutch settlement heritage, with brick carved by hand. Funded through the Works Progress Administration during the Depression, it is described as the only such project designed by a woman. Together the two properties are valued for their architecture and local history.