The White House Rose Garden in Photos: A Showcase of Presidential Power The White House Rose Garden in Photos: A Showcase of Presidential Power
The New York Times
A look at key moments at the White House’s signature outdoor setting amid reports that it may be turned into a Mar-a-Lago-like patio.
If there is a more famous garden in the United States than the White House Rose Garden, it is difficult to name. A showcase of presidential power for decades, the Rose Garden is built on what was once a colonial-style garden created by the first lady Edith Roosevelt in 1903. It was revised during Woodrow Wilson’s presidency, later used for greenhouses and then transformed into a neutral green space that presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower deployed for ceremonies and receptions.
It was not until the presidency of John F. Kennedy that the White House Rose Garden as we know it came into being. Conceived of by the first lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, the garden was designed in collaboration with the heiress Rachel Lambert Mellon in 1962 and — until the first lady, Melania Trump, initiated polarizing revisions in 2020 — remained unaltered in spirit from a tranquil green space used as a symbolic backdrop for the grandeur of the presidency.
That may all change soon. President Trump has told associates that he wants to create a better place for entertaining guests by ripping up the grass that has dominated the Rose Garden for decades and replacing it with a hard surface to resemble the patio at his Palm Beach, Fla., estate, Mar-a-Lago.
“Next to the Oval Office and the East Room, the Rose Garden is the most iconic setting’’ at the White House, Lori Cox Han, who teaches political science at Chapman University in California and who has written about how presidents utilize the Rose Garden, said in an interview. “It has always stood as a symbol of resilience and continuity,’’ she added. “What is it going to become, Mar-a-Lago north?’’
Still in use for bill-signing ceremonies, news conferences, award presentations and formal state dinners, the Rose Garden has, in certain ways, been an entertainment space all along. Yet, with its sentinel crab apple trees and the rose bushes planted at President Kennedy’s request — declaring “Bunny Mellon was no dummy,” Mac Griswold, a biographer of Ms. Mellon, said in an interview that the original design called for only 13 rose bushes as a result of Washington’s climate — the Rose Garden retains indelible associations with presidents of the past.
