Historic Landscape Path Material Accessibility Study

Abstract

Historic New England will research historically compatible landscape path materials to assess firmness and stability as an indicator of accessibility; aesthetics and historical authenticity; grit tracking and transmission levels; and installation and maintenance costs. The project will study various fine aggregate path materials, with and without binders, and extant path materials at a historic house museum. The study will collect data throughout the project term to assess the impact of weather, visitor compaction, and applied compaction on accessibility, aesthetics, grit transmission, and costs. The study provides critical data not currently included in preservation literature that will inform historic site stewards of landscape path materials that meet these multiple priorities.

Personnel

Benjamin Haavik

Benjamin Haavik, team leader for property care at Historic New England, is responsible for preserving and maintaining its thirty-eight historic properties open to the public and developing and managing the preservation budget for these sites. He oversees fifteen full-time staff, including preservation carpenters, preservation managers, and landscape staff. He has a master's degree in Historic Preservation from the University of Pennsylvania and is a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC). He has been with Historic New England for seventeen years.

Tatyanna (Tanya) Seredin

Tatyanna (Tanya) Seredin is a landscape architect at the design firm Mohr & Seredin Landscape Architects in Portland Maine. The firm has provided land planning and landscape architectural services since 1989. The principals, Stephen Mohr and Tatyanna Seredin have more than seventy years of experience in all facets of landscape architecture. They have worked on more than 1,000 projects throughout the state of Maine and New England since the firm's inception. Past projects range in size and scale from garden design to master planning for large developments. The firm is the recipient of numerous local, state, and national awards and honors.

Historic New England has been working with Mohr & Seredin on historic landscape projects and reports since the 1990s. Mr. Haavik has recently worked with Ms. Seredin on accessibility project designs for parking and site circulation for Cogswell's Grant in Essex, Mass. and the Codman Estate in Lincoln, Mass.