The Mortimer Fleishhacker House, also known as the Green Gables Estate, is a historic estate with an English manor house, built between 1911 and 1935, and located at 329 Albion Avenue in Woodside, California.[2] The house has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since September 26, 1986.[3][4]
The main house is two stories tall, and was created in an English manor-style with an imitation thatch roof, a gunite exterior, and consisting of ten bedrooms.[5][6] The garden is Italian style and features four levels of terracing and a lily pond, a Roman reflecting pool, and a piano-shaped swimming pool.[5][7]
The Green Gables Estate was used and remained in the Fleishhacker family for five generations.[11][12]
Property and landscaping
Mortimer Fleishhacker House Roman Pool (1933)
In 1911, Fleishhacker Sr. and his wife Bella Gerstle Fleishhacker (1875–1963), commissioned Charles Sumner Greene of the architectural firm Greene and Greene to design a country home for them on a 45-acre property.[2][11] This was the largest of all Greene and Greene designs.[5] The interior of the house was designed by Elsie de Wolfe and the San Francisco design house of Vickery, Atkins and Torrey.[13] When designing the home, Greene also took into account the design of the landscaping and the driveway.[7][14]
The property's rolling green lawns were inspired by the Fountains Abbey of Studley Royal Park in 18th-century England, which Greene had visited in 1909.[14] The garden has natural materials used and design elements that complement the landscape such as terraces, walls, arcades, balustrades, and planting urns.[15] Over the years, the Fleishhacker family built out the estate, adding new structures and land.[16][17]
Modern history
The property was used to host family weddings, corporate retreats, and historic summits; including a United Nations 20th-anniversary gala in 1965.[12] The estate was filmed as the Martin family home in the 1999 film Bicentennial Man.[18] As of 2019, the estate is 74-acres in size.[16][19][20]
^ ab"Green Gables - The Estate". The New York Times. In 1965, the United Nations selected Green Gables as the site for its 20th anniversary commemoration gala.
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