Great Lawn and Turtle Pond

Coordinates: 40°46′53″N 73°57′59″W / 40.78135°N 73.96648°W / 40.78135; -73.96648

The Great Lawn and Turtle Pond are two connected features of Central Park which are located in Manhattan, New York City.

Description

The lawn and pond occupy the almost flat site of the rectangular, thirty-five-acre Lower Reservoir constructed in 1842, which was an unalterable fixture of the location of Central Park as it was first designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. The King Jagiello Monument stands at Turtle Pond's east end, the Delacorte Theater on its west end.

Within its schist walling, the reservoir filled the space between the 79th Street and 86th Street Transverse Roads. The Belvedere Castle, built in 1869, overlooked it from its southwest corner.

In Egbert Viele's rejected plan for Central Park, whose design inadequacies prompted the design competition of 1857-58, the civil engineer "considered the reservoir worthy of attention as a major engineering feat, and his plan emphasized it by adding a terrace to the walls, from which spectators could observe military drills". Proponents of the naturalistic plans in the competition "repeatedly recommended 'planting out' the park boundaries and the 'ugly', 'artificial', 'uncouth', 'horrid', and 'discordant' distraction of the reservoirs in order to reinforce the sense of natural expanse".

Lawn

A lawn is an area of soil-covered land planted with grasses or (rarely) other durable plants such as clover which are maintained at a short height with a lawnmower and used for aesthetic and recreational purposes. Common characteristics of a lawn are that it is composed only of grass species, it is subject to weed and pest control, it is subject to practices aimed at maintaining its green color (e.g., watering), and it is regularly mowed to ensure an acceptable length, although these characteristics are not binding as a definition. Lawns are used around houses, apartments, commercial buildings and offices. Many city parks also have large lawn areas. In recreational contexts, the specialised names turf, pitch, field or green may be used, depending on the sport and the continent.

The term "lawn", referring to a managed grass space, dates to no earlier than the 16th century. Tied to suburban expansion and the creation of the household aesthetic, the lawn is an important aspect of the interaction between the natural environment and the constructed urban and suburban space. In many suburban areas, there are bylaws in place requiring houses to have lawns and requiring the proper maintenance of these lawns. In some jurisdictions where there are water shortages, local government authorities are encouraging alternatives to lawns to reduce water use.

Old House

Old House could refer to:

This Old House

This Old House is an American home improvement media brand with television shows, a magazine and a website, ThisOldHouse.com. The television series airs on the American television station Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and follows remodeling projects of houses over a number of weeks. This Old House is produced by This Old House Ventures, Inc. with WGBH Boston as the PBS distributing station. Warner Bros. Domestic Television distributes the series to commercial television stations in syndication. Time Inc. launched This Old House magazine in 1995, focusing on home how-to, know-how and inspiration. In 2001, Time Inc. acquired the television assets from WGBH Boston and formed This Old House Ventures, Inc.

Overview

This Old House and its sister series Ask This Old House are often broadcast together as The This Old House Hour (originally known as The New This Old House Hour). Both shows are owned by This Old House Ventures, Inc. (a subsidiary of Time, Inc.) and are underwritten by GMC and The Home Depot. Weyerhauser lumber distributor, a previous underwriter, by 1989 had donated more than $1,000,000 a year to the show.This Old House is also underwritten by State Farm Insurance and Lumber Liquidators, Inc. Other underwriters throughout the show's tenure included Parks Corporation, Glidden paints, Montgomery Ward, Ace Hardware, Kohler plumbing, Schlage locks, Century 21 Real Estate, Toro lawnmowers/snowblowers, ERA Real Estate, Angie's List, and Mitsubishi Electrics. Two of the original underwriters were Weyerhauser and Owens-Corning.