Imagine New York City’s Central Park carved into an eclectic mix of ponds and glades or consumed by a labyrinth of French topiary, and you will see the Park as several landscape designers envisioned it in 1857. The Central Park design competition was the suggestion of English designer, Calvert Vaux, who disliked the original, unartistic plan by engineer, Egbert Ludovicus Viele. The competition was also an ingenious way of ensuring that the 843-acre chunk of Manhatttan real estate—nearly twice the size of the Principality of Monaco—would meet as many New Yorkers’ expectations as possible. The Central Park Commission received 33 design submissions, ranging in quality from stolidly practical to fantastical. The 11-man, state-appointed commission selected park superindentant, Frederick Law Olmsted’s, and English designer, Calvert Vaux’s, “Greensward” plan on April 28, 1858.

This coming Monday marks the 150th anniversary of the Greensward plan’s adoption, which the Central Park Conservancy in New York City will commemorate with a series of public events, including the re-christening of the 72nd Street Cross Drive as “Olmsted & Vaux Way.” The tribute is well-deserved. “Olmsted and Vaux’s design,” says park historian Sara Cedar Miller, “was the most important work of American art in the 19th century.” Its success inspired municipalities across America, such as Boston and Chicago, to create their own pastoral retreats from the claustrophobic city.

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