Imagine a library where you can view one of the very few copies of William Shakespeare’s First Folio published in 1635 and after walk through the Shakespeare garden resplendent with an Italian fountain and Roman sculpture.

Afterwards visit a lovely tea cottage in a rose garden and enjoy tea and scones along with a variety of other treats on fine English china.

This is just a few of the many options at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California. Just outside of Pasadena in Southern California the Huntington Library includes museum galleries, a Japanese Garden more like a temple ground than any I’ve experienced outside of Kyoto, varieties of other gardens including a desert garden full of the most exotic plants in the world.

The desert garden

A lawn of three or four acres with a single small Greek temple and stands of thick bamboo are two examples of what is common here. A visit to the Huntington is truly the equivalent of a tour of the world in a single pack like setting.

2008 has been a significant year in the history of the Huntington Library. In May of this year the completely transformed art galleries of the main gallery were opened with renovated rooms, displays and new galleries.
The museum opened the new Chinese Gardens “The Garden of Flowing Fragrance”, the library itself has been reimagined and a gallery for temporary exhibitions is added to the library building.

The main gallery always felt cramped to me with furniture and decorative art seemingly stacked about. The new main gallery, doubled in size due to the opening up of the upstairs rooms to art display, is a much-improved arrangement. The building was originally the living quarters for Mr. Henry Huntington and his wife, Arabella, and the curator has successfully returned the museum to express this original purpose. Art galleries are in rooms that demonstrate original use; offices, sitting rooms and dining rooms are all furnished with original furniture and decorative art. The art is seen in a fashion reflecting the place they held in the original decorative concept. Dishes, silverware and other dining items are well represented in Plexiglas boxes.
The paintings are late 18th century works by British painters of portraiture such as Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds and the decorative art is also of this period with the (in my opinion) excess ornamentation common to the period. I was very please that upstairs several galleries contained works by William Morris and other influenced by him and the Arts and Crafts Movement, work much more to my taste. One of the pieces from the Morris collection is the David Healey Memorial Window from the Unitarian Chapel, Heywood, Lancashire, c. 1898. These windows are a lovely example from this period and this school of thought.

The Library is newly laid out with an edited version of the previous display. The books on display in the dark wood panel rooms are representative of the greater collection owned by the library. The Gutenberg Bible, one of only 12 in the world printed on vellum, is still central and is displayed as the first book you see when entering. Beginning with hand illuminated texts from the medieval period and continuing on to include original drawings and writing from the colonial period including drawings by George Washington, the library display is a retrospective of literature and writers in the Anglo-American tradition through the mid-20th century. With an abbreviated display of the books, a new gallery spaced was opened for temporary exhibits, the current exhibit is a photography exhibit titled “This Side of Paradise: Body and Landscape in L. A.”: a cutting edge compendium of the figure in the landscape of Los Angeles with photos from the early 19th Century through the most recent decades.

New to the library in 2008 is the Chinese Garden, The Garden of Flowing Fragrance. This garden is a response to the Chinese Diaspora in San Gabriel Valley, for example over 48% of the residents of San Marino are Asian-American, this demographic is repeated through-out the area east of Pasadena. The new Chinese is designed to meet the needs and interest of this population.

The most important thing I can say about The Garden of Flowing Fragrance is its serenity. A pond of blossoming lotus, a family of ducks, stone imported from China for authenticity; this garden is a wonderful resource for all of LA, not just the ethnic Chinese of San Gabriel Valley.

A dim sum meal at the Chinese Garden