Lower Garden

The lower garden is an excellent example of a Colonial Revival garden representing a formal English kitchen garden. It continues to produce vegetables as it did more than 200 years ago.

This area was used as the kitchen garden throughout the Washingtons’ years at Mount Vernon. It had brick walls for protection and warmth, terracing for level gardening, and espaliered pears and apples along the walks that provided a wind break for vegetables. The garden supplied much of the essential produce for the family kitchen, including head vegetables such as lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower and herbs such as dill and chives. As plantation mistress, Martha Washington was responsible for this garden, and called the abundance of vegetables “the best part of our living in the country.”