An unlikely, for Florida brown, Tudor-style fairy tale dwelling, Lichgate Cottage, sits snug by a big brown tree in North Florida. This is the hand-built haven of author & classics professor at Florida State University, Laura Jepsen, who died in 1995.
Miss Jepsen bought undeveloped land because of a single tree she couldn’t get out of her mind, once she had climbed over a barbed wire fence to get a close look at it.
It became her dream to save it & live near it. She scraped up the money to create hand-built, artisan-carted cottage on the land, so she could watch over the tree.
This majestic oak with boughs that bow down to the ground is listed on a national tree register & is the subject of a landscape portrait by a noted tree artist. It is also detailed in the out-of-print history, LICHGATE ON HIGH ROAD, created by Laura Jepsen.
Volunteers who interpreted & preserved the Lichgate Cottage & the Lichgate Oak, created The Laura Jepsen Institute. They celebrate the life of Laura Pauline Jepsen.
Lichgate evokes an
Anne Hathaway cottage from England,
transported as if by magic
to Florida, USA.
Lichgate Oak bends her boughs
to the ground and sweeps them
up to the sky
to create an outdoor room.
An enrolled
member of the Live Oak Society,
Lichgate Oak keeps
company with the
hand-crafted cottage.
Master nature artist
Stephen Malkoff/arboresque
found his way to the tree
& decided to create a
portrait in stunning detail.
A one-act play
under the spreading boughs
of Lighgate Oak,
– LAURA, LIVE!,
about Miss
Jepsen, performed by the
accomplished actress
Barbara Speisman (co-creator
of the play with primary scriptwriter
Jan Godown Annino) interpreted Miss
Jepson’s steps in magical creation of
this unlikely for Florida, homestead
& personal park.
Volunteers worked to have the three-acre
Lichgate on High Road property,
which includes the unique
canine cottage
in the style of the original
historic building,
elevated to the
National Register of Historic Places.
The work of past volunteer executive
director Jody Taylor is especially
appreciated, along with historian
Bob Stone.
Other interpretative efforts
are creatively underway.
This urban eden,
with grandmother live oak tree,
fairy tale cottage,
vegetable garden
& flower garden &
more enchantment
is yours to discover & to
protect, in Tallahassee,
Florida.
~~
Gardens & More
A visit from Atlas Obscura to Lichgate.
Lichgate Labyrinth
Lichgate offers, tucked away in a quiet corner, a series of circles to walk in contemplation.
For more information on labyrinths worldwide visit Veriditas http://veriditas.org or
The Labyrinth Society http://labyrinthsociety.org
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