Opendore

Opendore, the estate of suffragist Isabel Howland, is a significant property within the Sherwood Equal Rights Historic District. Built in 1837, the house and its 10 acres of former gardens and woodland served generations of the Howland family and became a naturalistic heart of the community’s pioneering Quaker ideologies of abolitionism and women’s rights. Aligning with Isabel’s “open door” wordplay, the house and gardens were open to the community and hosted significant events in support of the Women’s Suffrage Movement.

After decades of abandonment the structure was rehabilitated by the volunteer non-profit Howland Stone Store Museum. Turning efforts to the neglected landscape, the organization realized a prior plan for the long-since removed historic gardens was at odds with extreme post-1950 hydrological changes, which effectively converted a portion of the property into a wetland. The organization wanted to understand why the current drainage patterns seemed so different and, in the Quaker spirit, needed a new landscape treatment plan that would coexist with the current ecology.

SERVICES
Historic Preservation
Planting Design

RECOGNITION
2026 Merit Award, Historic Preservation Category
New York Upstate Chapter, American Society of Landscape Architects